Finals Ain't What They Used To Be

So, tomorrow will see Liverpool and Chelsea facing off against each other in the 131^st FA Cup Final – the premier showpiece occasion at the end of the English football season. Or rather, not. You see, The FA Cup Final ain’t what it used to be. Let me take you back....

The time was when the FA Cup Final was the only club match that you could be guaranteed of seeing live on TV. You might also get to see the finals of the European Cup or UEFA Cup if a British team were involved, but that was about it. Even England international games weren’t shown live as a matter of course, as was gloriously illustrated in the famous episode of “Whatever Happened to The Likely Lads”, where they spent the whole day trying to avoid an England result before they watch the highlights in the evening. So the fact that a game was being shown live was an occasion of itself.

Cup Final day was one of the most exciting days of the year in a young boy’s life. It was just about the only Saturday of the year when you would willingly get out of bed early. The TV would go on at about 9:00 a.m., and there you would sit for the next 9 hours. First off would be such treats as “Cup Final It’s A Knockout”, “Cup Final A Question of Sport”, “Cup Final Mastermind” or ...well, you get the idea. There would be regular reports from the two hotels where the teams were staying, and about  late morning Frank Bough or Dickie Davies (depending on whether you were watching BBC or ITV) would interview a couple of the players and the managers. This was mind-blowing stuff back then. Further interviews at Wembley with the likes of Tarby or Brucie or some other 70’s comedian would follow.

Early afternoon and we would have the joy of watching live as the two team coaches left their respective hotels on their way to Wembley. More discussion with the likes of Saint & Greavsie, Bob Wilson, Jack Charlton, etc would precede the arrival of the teams at the stadium amidst much talk of “going down Wembley Way” or “remember the White Horse Final” or “the Matthews Final”.  Then Tony Gubba or Tony Francis would buttonhole the players as they took a look at the Cup Final playing surface. Excitement on the sofa was pretty much at fever pitch by this point. The living room would be steadily increasing its population as kick-off time now approached. And then the moment would arrive – the Cup Final itself. What a way to end the season, and to bid farewell to all things football for another three months. Those matches are seared onto my mind, as they are to every football fan who lived through that time. True spectacle, and a real feel of occasion permeated the whole day. The FA Cup truly was the greatest cup competition in the world, and the final was the biggest day in the football calendar.

But now? Well, now the Cup Final isn’t even the last match of the season. The Premier League carries on for another week afterwards and there are even league matches being played on the same day as the final. The match has now been elbowed to a tea-time kick-off with the TV coverage starting a mere two hours before kick-off. The teams competing during the season have often fielded weakened teams for their FA cup matches as the priority now is very much the Premiership or the Champions League. There is even a possibility that Chelsea won’t be putting out their very strongest team tomorrow as they rest players ahead of their Champions League Final appearance in a couple of weeks time.

The Final is now just one of dozens (if not hundreds) of matches shown live each season and fans are wearily familiar with every team and every player. The competition no longer holds the place in the football season that it used to – both literally and figuratively. The world has moved on I guess, but progress doesn’t always mean improvement.

The Good, The Bad and The Ugly (Without The Good!)

I step away from my blog for a few days and all hell seems to break out!

First off there was the Rooney incident at Wigan when he ambushed James McCarthy – flooring the Wigan midfielder with an elbow to the head. Somehow Rooney managed to escape without any punishment at all. The referee gave a free-kick but handed out no cards – which means there is no way he could have actually seen the incident because, if he had, then Rooney would have played no further part in the game. Then Alex Ferguson, who won’t speak to the BBC because one of their reporters looked at him funny one time, or something, sent out assistant Mike Phelan who whimpered that “we can’t dispute the referee’s decision”.

This farce was then made worse when the FA kowtowed to the “mighty Man Utd” and refused to apply any subsequent punishment on Rooney because, they say, the referee saw the incident and dealt with it at the time. I have to suspect that if it had been a different player, playing for a different team that a different outcome would have occurred somewhere along the line. Either the referee would have sent the player off, or admitted afterwards that he did not see the offence, or the authorities would have seen fit to apply a more proper and appropriate punishment after the fact.

Ironically it was Manchester United who were moaning about the officials in their very next game, when they slipped to defeat against Chelsea. No talk now about respecting the match officials’ decisions. Ferguson was angry that the ref failed to send off Davd Luiz and commented that he had “feared the worst” when he saw who the referee was to be. He also said that “you want a fair referee .... and we didn’t get that”. The irony couldn’t really get any thicker. Ferguson has a habit of disrespecting match officials when he doesn’t get his own way, and has a suspended 2-match touchline ban from last season for a similar offence. The FA has charged him again with improper conduct, but they seem incapable of applying any suitable and effective penalty. I don’t expect a different outcome this time either.

And further disciplinary controversy was to follow in midweek, this time north of the border. A very fiery Old Firm clash resulted in 3 Rangers players being sent off, 13 bookings, a series of touchline flare-ups and a very angry confrontation between Celtic manager Neil Lennon and Rangers assistant Ally McCoist. So bad was the atmosphere and behaviour at this match that the Scottish Government have intervened and announced that they will be holding a summit meeting between the two clubs, the Scottish FA, the police and themselves. 34 arrests were made inside the stadium, with plenty more outside. I am all for a bit of passion in football, but I think things may have gotten a teensy bit out of control up there. Wish I’d seen the game, mind!

What A Weekend!

Well, that was quite a weekend for top sporting action. The big event was Super Bowl XLV and the game certainly lived up to the hype - so much so, in fact, that I stayed up to gone 3:00 a.m. to see the climax of the whole thing.

The Vince Lombardi Trophy, Uploaded on flickr.com by user "pkeleher" [CC-BY-2.0], via Wikimedia Commons

Congratulations must go to the Green Bay Packers for a tremendous 31-25 win over the Pittsburgh Steelers. But, as with most sports, the result doesn’t even begin to tell the story of the match, which ebbed and flowed throughout. The Packers led 21-3 at one stage early in the game, but a tremendous comeback from the Steelers got them to within 3 points of their opponents, and with the momentum on their side the Championship was definitely there for the taking. But, the Packers regrouped and found the determination to score again and deny the Steelers a third Super Bowl victory in six years. For me, it was an excellent contest and the destination of the Lombardi Trophy was up for grabs right until the dying seconds. Sport at its best.

Elsewhere, the Premiership did their best to try to outshine the showpiece occasion on the other side of the pond. A breathtaking weekend of action, with some amazing scorelines, produced the greatest total of goals on one day – 41 from the 8 games played on Saturday. A stunning comeback by Newcastle Utd saw them recover from 0-4 down after 26 minutes to grab an unlikely 4-4 draw in the last few minutes. That is the first time a team has recovered from a 4 goal deficit in the history of the Premiership. And that was by no means the only sensation of the day, with previously unbeaten Manchester Utd succumbing to bottom of the table Wolves and slipping to a 2-1 defeat.

There were also 8 goals at Everton, in a game that swung one way and then the other, and back again. 7 goals at Wigan, 5 at Stoke and 4 at Aston Villa all managed to push up that record total. The expected titanic clash of Chelsea and Liverpool on Sunday was very mild in comparison and Fernando Torres was kept extremely quiet by his ex-teammates before being substituted in the second half. A 1-0 victory for the visiting side has now realistically ended any hopes that Chelsea may have had of winning the title this year. In fact, they may well be looking over their shoulders at Tottenham and Liverpool themselves in the battle for a Champions League place.

As I mentioned on Saturday, this weekend was also the start of the Six Nations and there were victories for England, Ireland and France. Those latter two teams will meet each other at the Aviva Stadium, Dublin on this coming Saturday, whilst England will play Italy, and Scotland will host Wales.

All in all, it was a very eventful and exciting sporting weekend. May there be many more like it ahead of us.