When I was growing up (work still very much in progress, as Simon would probably have it), there was an absolute magic about the cup. I can remember without looking it up all the winners of the FA Cup going back to 1970.  I certainly can’t do this with the First Division as it used to be called. There are a number of reasons for this.  First, as a kid my attention span was much shorter and I had no conception of the sustained effort needed to win the league.  It certainly helped that Arsenal never came close to winning the first Division, which impacted on my interest in the league title.  We did have the good fortune to play in three consecutive cup finals in the late 70s which heightened my interest in the knockout format.

The most important factor in the affection I had for the FA Cup growing up was the fact that the final and the England V Scotland game were the only two live matches I got to see throughout the whole season. As I didn’t go to many games in the 1970s the idea of seeing the entire ninety minutes of a game was a big attraction.

In 1983 ITV screened the first live league game of our generation between Tottenham Hotspur and Nottingham Forest. I remember Brian Clough expressing the view that he hoped the game would be a boring one, as he didn’t want this to be the future direction of football coverage. I recall it being a pretty good game, with Spurs prevailing 2-1. Perhaps the game would be better today had Clough been right and the whole idea of live league football scrapped. He was wrong and we are where we are.  In those days the television rights were carved up between BBC and ITV for £5.2m. The last television deal prior to the Sky deal in 1992 was for almost £50m. By the late 1980s it had become obvious that screening live football was the most valuable commodity in broadcasting. You don’t need me to tell you how the finances have spiralled since then.

Today the FA Cup Final is one of about 500 games you can watch live from start to finish if you have the time, the inclination and the technology. The loss of that rarity value has robbed the FA Cup, and particularly the final, of much of its lustre. Final day used to be such an occasion. There would be a big build up in the morning. I well remember the 1978 final between Ipswich Town and Arsenal. We had Cup Final Master Mind, It’s a Knockout and the sight of the team coaches arriving in Olympic Way. We get the same kind of build up now for the meanest of Premier League clashes, with Richard Keys trying to sell it to us as this week’s Game of the Century. (Not any more!! Hah! – Ed)

The saturation coverage of football in general has not helped the cup much either. In my day, young lad (brass band in the background playing the music from the Hovis advert) there was only about four or five hours of football programming every week. Football Focus and On The Ball at Saturday lunchtime, Match of the Day and The Big Match on weekend evenings and Sportsnight and Midweek Sports Special on a Wednesday. There is no Parkinson’s Law that decrees that the volume of information that can be intelligently broadcast on the game will expand to accommodate the hours and pages that need to be filled. There used to be an eight page pull out in the papers for the FA Cup Final. Now you get a sixteen page pull out for every week’s games.

As an Arsenal fan, I think of the FA Cup as very much third priority. If we were to win the cup and finish fifth in the Premier League I would rate this as a disaster. You may not be able to raise fourth place in the league above your head, and it may not glint in the May sunshine, but that position in the table is worth a fortune to us.

I really don’t like myself for expressing the thought in the above paragraph. I used to watch cup football for the simple joy of seeing two teams trying to beat each other in a one off game. The FA Cup was that one gap in the schedule where positions didn’t matter and all really were equal, at least for the first few minutes of the game. If Arsenal play Wrexham ten times, we will beat them on nine occasions. The last time we played them, they showed what the cup should be about, despite us having finished first the season before and Wrexham finishing ninety second. They would have been out of the league altogether if Kidderminster had had a ground up to scratch. I can look back on this as a wonderful moment for the game now, although you would have been most unwise to have put that point to me on the day it happened.

And so to motive. How have we come to think of a tournament’s value in terms of revenue rather than its potential to put something in our increasingly cavernous trophy cabinet??  The honest answer is that football at the highest level has become something of an arms race.  If our opposition have a weapon, we have to have it too.  The weapon?  Money.  I utterly deplore this trend, but I don’t see a way out of it.  Nobody will have more respect than me for the first team to do themselves out of a top four finish in order to win the FA Cup. I just hope it isn’t Arsenal that does it.

When Samuel Hill Wood assumed control of Arsenal in 1929 the board wanted to run the club as a means of providing inexpensive entertainment for the working class population of Islington.  This does sound quaint by today’s standards.  I have been very fortunate in the last few years to see some of the best players in the club’s history.  They would not have been at Arsenal under any other financial conditions than those that prevail at the highest level in the modern game.  Mr Wenger is doing what he can to build a team without paying top dollar.  His relative lack of success in the last five years has become a subject of much discussion among football fans and pundits at the lower end of the evolutionary scale.

Ironically we have done well in the FA Cup under the current management, winning the tournament four times.  It is symptomatic of the way I feel about the cup that the only two of these victories that gave me real joy were part of league and cup doubles.

My attitude to the cup in its modern state can best be summed up by an incident that occurred following the last occasion on which we won it in 2005. We were absolutely murdered by Manchester United, but managed to win on penalties. The victory was part glorious and part hilarious. Driving home with Simon the following day through West London we got caught up in heavy traffic. This was caused by Chelsea fans going to the celebrations of their recent Premier League triumph. I remember the sweetness of the previous day’s victory turning to ashes in my mouth. I wanted what they had won, but I doubt they wanted what we had just stolen.

I am totally in favour of the premise of this website, but I do have one point to make. I have to say that those waiting for the money to fall out of the Premier League and for the players to travel to the game on the same bus as the supporters are probably in for a bit of a wait. I don’t entirely accept the idea that grass roots football is any more real than the Premier League, but I whole heartedly agree that their motives for participating in the FA Cup are more genuine than that of their lofty opponents.

The problem with writing these words is that I can’t really think of any solution. There have been quite a few changes to the FA Cup since I started watching the game. I don’t believe there is any chance of going back to the way things were, and probably no appetite for it among the supporters that will follow us in time.

One of the really disrespectful practices in the FA Cup (for which my team must assume its share of guilt) is the habit of playing weakened teams in games we think of as easy. The penalty for not qualifying for the Champion’s League, being relegated or not promoted is just too high for most clubs to contemplate. The lack of respect for the cup is one of the factors that have led to its diminishment in the eyes of many. If the teams can’t be bothered with this game, why should we? Until this season the last time Tottenham beat us on our own ground was in 1993 when we put out a weakened side in the league as we were due to face Sheffield Wednesday in the FA Cup Final. How times have changed.

The media habit of referring to cup ties featuring two big Premier League teams as the game of the round is another irritant for a lot of supporters. If you are a Tooting and Mitcham fan, then your tie against Dagenham and Redbridge is the tie of the round as far as you are concerned. If Tooting and Mitcham knock Cardiff out of the cup that is as much of a shock as Wrexham beating Arsenal. You will know that from your own experience if you are a Tooting fan, but you would never learn it from the media.

The main change over the last twenty years has been the abolition of what used to be known as the cup saga. In the late 70s we once took five games to get past Sheffield Wednesday.  In 1980 we beat Liverpool in the semi final after three replays. As late as 1991 we took four games to get past Leeds United. To younger readers this may seem as quaint as the cricket match between the Gentlemen and the Players, but I remember these sagas as being quite fun. Their abandonment may have been more economic in terms of player energy and policing costs, but it is one of those tell tale signs that football can no longer be played just for the sake of it. Settling every tie in one game as the semis and the final are now would be yet another step in this direction.

Giving a place in the Champion’s League to the winner of the FA Cup seems a bit generous. Heaven knows the tournament has enough teams in it who really shouldn’t be there, as I shall doubtless find when we visit Camp Nou. Exempting the big clubs who play weakened teams from the tournament would turn it into a glorified version of the Johnson’s paint Trophy.

In short, I don’t think any cosmetic change in the tournament will really help. Competitive ethos in any particular situation either exists or it doesn’t. It cannot be forced on anyone. The tournament we grew up with has become a victim of the increasing levels of professionalism since football became a billionaire’s plaything. I think that my club has done as much as it can to arrest the development. I am not entirely happy about this, as I would rather be competitive than noble in a results driven business (or sport, as it used to be called). I fear we may look back in twenty years time and equate Peter Hill Wood’s efforts to keep Arsenal in its current corporate state with King Canute’s attempt to command the tide.

None of this could have happened without the collusion of the supporters. I include myself in this. Football fans get the game they deserve, and we are all to blame for the current state of affairs. We pay the massive ticket prices, and subscribe to Sky for £50 every month. Despite the fact that I grew up without live football, I am part of a society that has been brainwashed into thinking that I can’t live without it. The game has no more power to dictate the abandonment of its traditions than we have given it. The cup will be won this year by the Premier League team that just couldn’t be bothered to lose it. Perhaps this could also be said for the Premier League itself this year.

If you listen to a football phone in on any given Saturday and listen to supporters’ total lack of patience or tolerance of anything less than winning, we see the penalty for failure has just become too high.  Teams will put out weakened sides to avoid relegation from the Premier League or to increase their chances of getting out of the Championship.

It is not easy to blame the big teams for their declining interest in the FA Cup when the Corinthian spirit appears to be dead on both sides of the touchline. Of course the sentiment in the previous sentence can be applied to the bye line if your ticket is for a seat behind the goal. I sit in a corner quadrant, so I have the best and worst of both worlds.

What this entire essay amounts to is a man lamenting the death of the traditions with which he grew up, whilst admitting a lack of inclination to do anything about it. I am jealous of those who still can feel that excitement. Perhaps it would take Arsenal suffering what Leeds did in 2004 before I could get that feeling for the FA Cup again. In the modern world Tradition has never been much of a flood barrier against the tidal wave of progress. We have a proud tradition of coal mining, ship building, steel making and manufacturing. We don’t seem to do much of this any more. This wasn’t twenty two men chasing a ball around a field, this was something that millions of men and women depended on for their livelihood. If tradition didn’t save them, how could it possibly save a cup tournament where you can get a piece of silverware for winning six games?

None of the above need bother any of the regular readers of this website. From the point of view of the teams that have to play their first qualifying games during the cricket season, the cup will always be just as exciting and meaningful as it ever was. Supporters of teams in the top flight who can’t see past the Premier League or the Champion’s League cannot totally blight the FA Cup. It will still produce its moments of magic, but this magic has perhaps declined in its ability to enchant fans who would rather be winning something else.

As a kid, I dreamt of scoring the winning goal in the last minute of the FA Cup Final. I can’t imagine kids today having this dream. It is far more likely that they imagine themselves being dissected in slow motion by Andy Gray (Not any more!! Hah! – Ed) on the Final Word while driving home in a car the purchase price of which would keep a League Two team solvent for half a season.

The only good thing about this state of affairs is that my goodish (ahem) friend Simon Barnett has built an excellent website out of the remnants of what the FA Cup used to be. In the 70s and 80s the FA Cup was the Real FA Cup. There would have been no need for such a website. Simon would probably have tried to build such a website anyway, even though there would have been no internet to post it on. He may be a stubborn bodger, but he is our stubborn bodger.

Chelsea and Ipswich, though in different leagues, have a similar story to tell in the last couple of months. Defeats, draws, misery and solitary league wins; Ipswich though managed to show a League Cup quarter-final win over West Brom in that period. In the week preceding the tie, Chelsea managed to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat only to throw it away again as I literally aged a year during the last 10 minutes of the game against Aston Villa. Midweek saw us travelling to the bottom side in the league and coming back with only the matchday programme. For the fine people of Suffolk it wasn’t any better. First they saw Dani Filth voted as the Icon of Suffolk in a poll conducted by ‘Choose Suffolk’ tourism website and then they saw his name being taken off the final list by the judges. Good Call, in my opinion! On the football front, the team slipped to yet another defeat at home to Forest. Carlo Ancelotti and Roy Keane, were both heavily tipped for the sack by the bookmakers; it was a matter of which owner blinked first. Marcus Evans couldn’t hold his nerve and another Roy was consigned to history, joined later in the week by the affable Hodgson. It’s a results business at the end of the day and few Ipswich fans, I have talked to, are shedding any tears. Ian McParland, former Notts County boss, took temporary charge for the visit to the capital.

It was a bright Sunday afternoon in this corner of West London as I set on my way to Stamford Bridge. Getting off at Earls Court, I looked around expecting to see a few tractors in the vicinity but there were none. Presumably, the Ipswich fans had parked them on the periphery of London and had decided, in fine London tradition, to tube it to the Bridge. With the increasing ticket prices, many people have been priced out of premier league football. If you want to take a child to any stand apart from the East Stand, you have to pay the full adult price. Where is the logic in that? Cup games therefore are a welcome break as the club have stuck with their policy of reducing admission prices. In today’s game for example, kids would have got in for 12 pounds which isn’t bad at all to watch the current FA Cup holders. It was therefore a pleasant sight to see more families and kids, as I made my way through the West Brompton cemetery thinking about the game ahead and at the same time reflecting on the futility of this life.

In spite of the midweek setback at Wolves, there was positivity all around in the Chelsea camp pre-match. Chelsea gave first starts to young England U-17 international Joshua McEachran and Dutch U-21 international Patrick Van Aanholt. With Grant Leadbitter suspended, Jake Livermore injured and Jack Colback recalled by Steve Bruce, Ipswich were missing a few players of their own but young England U-17 stiker Connor Wickham, chased by a number of clubs, was in the starting line-up . Chelsea have fallen into a dreadful habit of starting games on the backfoot lately but it wasn’t the case today as, right from the first whistle, there was assertiveness in our play. Early exchanges presented Chelsea with a host of opportunities with Anelka, Sturridge and McEachran all working the Ipswich defence. For the visitors, Jason Scotland had the best chance in the first half but he saw his left-footed shot, which swerved in the air, tipped away by Petr Cech. There was a moment of concern for the Chelsea fans in the first half when Petr Cech was knocked out in a collision with Wickham but fortunately the Czech managed to recover.

With the clock ticking past the half-hour mark and Chelsea not making the most of the opportunities, you began to wonder if it was going to be one of those days. It wasn’t. Anelka, who was having a great game, then danced through the Ipswich defence and struck a powerful shot past Fulop. The latter did manage to get a hand to it but there was too much momentum on the ball and he watched in despair as it inched towards the goal. And then Saloman Kalou arrived. Now, don’t get me wrong, I love Saloman Kalou as much as I love my local kebab shop but what he did next was daylight robbery, reminiscent of what Nugent did to Defoe.

Look…

There was no way any Ipswich player would have got to the ball even if Usain Bolt was playing for them. But, that’s why we love Saloman Kalou, who in the process scored his 50th goal for Chelsea. The lead was doubled moments later as Sturridge flicked Bosingwa’s cross with his right foot(I am lead to believe) into the net. David Norris then went flying into John Terry on the left flank. The referee immediately blew his whistle and booked the former Plymouth man. John Terry though, thought it was a fair tackle. From the resulting Lampard freekick, Carlos Edwards headed the ball into his own net as Chelsea went into the break 3-0 at HT. No disrespect to Ipswich fans, but before the whistle was blown, we were already checking out the FA Cup draw for the next round. Everton away. A difficult one, we reckoned. Ipswich fans presumably were already thinking about the journey back at that time.

As the team emerged from the tunnel for the second half, we were expecting more of the same. Moments after the restart Anelka had a quick one-two with Kalou before confidently placing it past Fulop. Best finish of the game I thought. An afternoon of misery continued for Ipswich as Sturridge doubled his goals tally with a curling right footed shot past the former Sunderland goalie, who must be thinking it was groundhog day all over again. There was a brief respite for the Ipswich team as goals dried up for the next twenty odd minutes but Chelsea were still on top. Ipswich, for all their endeavour, had nothing to show for it. Their passing was agricultural (excuse the pun) at best. Wickham cut a forlorn figure upfront and was later substituted. It was a difficult afternoon for the teenager up against two international centrebacks. Lampard, who was having his best game since return from injury, put the game to bed with a double strike near the 80th minute. First, he shot from the edge of the box, as the ball fell to him from an earlier corner. Second, some good work from McEachran released Ivanovic, whose low cross was tapped in by Frank. Chelsea fans chanted ‘We want eight’ but that would have been a bit too harsh on the Ipswich fans. As Andy D’Urso blew his final whistle, Chelsea had recorded their highest aggregate cup win, second only to the 9-1 win over Worksop Town in 1907. Que Sera Sera, ….. We’re going to Wembley (again) … we sang as crowd filtered out of the stadium onto the Fulham Road.

As I sit on the west side of the Shed, it’s sometimes difficult to make out the atmosphere in the away end, but I have it on good authority from someone who was there that it wasn’t anything special. The only bit which I could hear clearly from the away fans when they started off with ‘We’re the right side … We’re the left side’ in the second half. Most of them however stayed till the end and they were a credit to their club. In the home stands, the atmosphere was much better than the previous matches against Villa and Wolves, helped undoubtedly by the good performance and goals galore. I felt a tad sorry for Ian McParland, thrust into the position after Keane’s sacking and then having to see through the 7-0 defeat. The task doesn’t get any easier for him as they face Arsenal next. It’s easy to get carried away by this emphatic win as Chelsea supporters but that’s a mistake I believe few will make.

Today was all about the Cup though and after such a convincing victory we can afford to be a bit chipper. As I saw young cheerful faces going back home with their parents, and probably with some tales to recount to their friends and family, I realized that there was still magic in the cup; magic in a Chelsea v Ipswich 3rd round tie. Not in the way as we generally relate it to – a small unfashioned club standing up against the established hierarchy – but may be it’s about putting a smile on a child’s face.

Next stop. Merseyside.
———
Well, we said it was sometimes amusing for the underdog to get a smashing in the FA Cup. Cheers to Yasser for his take on this humiliating defeat for the Horses. And if you’re wondering about the rainbow photo, the end of it is in Cobham. It is.

It’s my favourite game to play and by far and away my favourite game to watch. It’s not always absolutely brilliant – in fact, sometimes it’s crushingly dull – but most of the time there is enough to capture the imagination and keep my eyes glued to the action, even in the most dire of circumstances.

In the 27 years I have been an Arsenal supporter, I have seen us play defensive football and flowing, attacking football and most things in between. But I think I can honestly say that I believe that our style of play has almost always been based on the resources available to us.

When George Graham one-nil’ed his way to the title in ’89, money was tight and who would argue that the finish to that season wasn’t the most exciting in history? Now that we have more disposable income, we are able to pay the best players more money and, as such, are playing in a more flamboyant style.

Since Rupert Murdoch parcelled our top division up into a shiny box and sold it to the people who were already watching it for free, the financial resources of some of the Premier League’s lucky few have gone from large to vast to double vast.

First, Roman Abramovich wandered into the gleaming Toy Shop of English football and sprinkled a few hundred million over perennial failures Chelsea and turned them into World Beaters (almost). Jose Mourinho took one look at the vast pot of money he had been presented with and spent almost all of it on men who were built like outhouses. Cunningly mingled with people who could actually play football, like Arjen Robben, they bought themselves a few titles.

Gradually, they realised that it was the beefy, whinging thugs in the team that were grinding out the results so the flair players bit the dust and Chelsea turned into Bolton Gold. Constant complaints to the referee, long throws, time-wasting and lots of tough challenges seemed to be the solution to winning the league.

Last season, even greater riches were bestowed upon another club which had won precious little in recent times, Manchester City and they set out about deciding how to spend it. Judging by last night, they seem to have chosen precisely the same route to success as Chelsea, despite apparently having enough money to choose any style they like.

Arsenal tried everything they could to try and make the ball go into the opposition’s net. They failed in no small part, because City were not interested in doing anything remotely like that. I have seen hundreds and hundreds of football matches at Highbury in my time, and a lot of them (particularly in the last few years) have been very one-sided. But I don’t ever remember a team failing to have a single shot on target in the entire match – and yet this club has access to an apparently bottomless pit of money.

After the game, Mancini said

I prefer one point and being booed than no points and being applauded off the pitch

which suggests that those were the only two options. I wonder whether, given the £1bn that has apparently been spent, “three points and being applauded off the pitch” could have been a realistic prospect?

Just like Chelsea just over a week ago, City’s millionaire superstars did everything they could to prevent any football from occurring. The only passes which went towards our goal either originated in their own penalty area or were either aimlessly punted into no-mans land.

As the game wore on and it became more and more likely that they would hold out for the nil-nil draw they came for, football seemed to be the last thing on the minds of the rich men. They began to sit down for minutes at a time whenever a foul was committed. Tevez and Jo took longer to walk off the pitch when their number was held aloft in dot-matrix form than it would have taken the stadium announcer to read out the full names and addresses of every single person present. The time wasting reached its staggering crescendo when their physio attempted to take Milner off for some treatment when he was ‘injured’ inside our six-yard box by going diagonally across the pitch rather than simply leaving the pitch behind the goal that he was standing next to.

As long as no football was taking place, they were more than happy, it seemed.

Is it really the case that, given the opportunity to buy almost any player in the world, most managers would automatically choose to buy 11 players who could probably give the All Blacks a decent game rather than some that can pass and move?

If the modern game continues in this vain, maybe we should just give every club access to such funds now and every match can be like this? From an Arsenal fan’s point of view, if every single Premier League game ended 0-0, then at least we’d win the league on alphabetical order.

So it was with a tinge of soggy dejection that we left work early on Friday evening to see our first FA Cup game of the season just as the heavens opened and the rain began to fall at the end of a miserable, grey day.

Mole Valley SCR were forced to leave their home in Fetcham last year and are currently sharing with Cobham FC whose ground – the marvellously named ‘Leg O Mutton Field’ – is barely 2 miles from Chelsea’s £20m state-of-the-art training complex across town but the rich and famous superstars who can often be seen flinging their 4x4s around the quiet country lanes in this particular part of suburbia were conspicuous by their absence as we supped a pint in The Running Mare on the way to the, errr, ‘field’. Maybe Abramovich’s overpaid ‘slaves’ were too busy collecting the gold that they’d discovered at the end of the rainbow that seemed to have one end firmly planted in John Terry’s back garden as we left the pub?

The majority of the crowd emerged from the understocked bar just before kick off to be faced with a downpour more commonly seen in the later rounds of the competition, in January or February than mid August and, with the seats which were under cover already full to bursting, we headed towards the shelter of some trees behind the MV goal for the bulk of the first half. But not before The Real FA Cup’s first touch of the season, your reporter scurrying between increasingly lake-like puddles to fetch the ball from behind the stand.

This was to be Mole Valley’s first foray into the old competition and hopes were high after two 4-1 victories in early skirmishes in the Combined Counties League. Chertsey Town, however, had had some thumping early results of their own and were not about to let MVSCR have their day in the pouring, miserable rain as they controlled most of the play in the early stages, Dean Papali missing their best chance early on when his downward header bounced into the ground and over the bar.

After 17 minutes, Dan Martin brought Papali down on the edge of the area and Tom O’Regan stepped up to put the visitors 1-0 up from the spot. Martin was harshly sent off for the offence, the referee having seemingly listened carefully to the advice given to him by the Chertsey fans behind the goal that ‘he was the last man’ and ‘simply had to go’. Sadly for the newcomers, the decision ruined any chance they had of debut success and when their defence was caught short at the back just before the half-time whistle (just as we were similarly compromised after our earlier visit to the local hostelry!) the outlook was looking increasingly bleak as the man in charge once again pointed to the spot. O’Regan was the victim this time and, once again, made no mistake as he picked himself up out of the mud and put his side 2-0 up at the break.

The rain had finally abated by half time but sustenance was badly needed so a return to the bar was required, a 10 minute queue wait culminating in being informed by the surly chefs that it would be “a while” before our burgers would be ready. The pair of George Foreman grills and the Morphy Richards deep fat fryer were doing overtime and neither the technology nor the staff, it would appear, could cope with the early season appetite for their greasy deliciousness.

So it was then that we returned to the second half action hungry, awaiting the delivery of our gourmet dinner.

The second half began in much the same vain as the first, but without the precipitation, and Chertsey increased their lead to 3 just before the hour when Papali’s shot deflected off substitute Liam Holden and looped over the Mole Valley keeper’s head and into the net behind him. Soon after, Papali scored his 2nd and Chertsey’s 4th after a great touch by his fellow striker which teed him up to rifle the ball home and seal the away side’s progress into the next round.

It’s always depressing to hear the captain of any side urging his players on to “keep their heads up” because “we know we’re beaten” with almost half an hour on the clock but it was fair comment. O’Regan wrapped things up with a 5th late on, but it could have been more.

By the time the final whistle had been blown, Mole Valley could have counted their goalscoring opportunities on the fingers of one finger and, in truth, deserved nothing from the game. Chertsey always had them where they wanted them and the sending off increased the size of the home side’s task to the realms of the impossible.

The impossible was, however, achieved by the Cobham catering staff, delivering us a burger only 15 minutes into the 2nd half and some (admittedly very nice, freshly cooked) chips with 10 minutes left on the clock.

Chertsey will go on to play Chatham in two weeks time and the question on everyone’s lips on that day, as with every other FA Cup tie this season, will be whether anyone can stop Spurs from winning the trophy which they famously win every time the year ends in ’1′.

We shall see.

Simon

Broadsheet, if not quite tabloid, opinion appears to be moving towards vilifying the ring leaders in this pathetic England team.  The general consensus being, ‘oh stop making excuses and grow a pair, you overpaid sensitive nancy boys’.  For too long now these pampered half-people have been blaming others or searching hard for excuses with which to pass off their failure and in doing this seem to forget that the fans expeect glorious failure but would rather avoid weak-willed, submission, lack of application and competence.  The players milk goodwill, act with wilful self interest and, astonishingly, also with excessive arrogance and delusion.

‘Clear the air talks’?  You’re presumably having a laugh?  The only air that really needs clearing is the hot stuff that emanates, permanently, from every robotic member of this bloated, media trained whiny squad.  There is something to be said for ensuring all England players are ‘in a good moment’, as Fabio might say, but there is a line where good preparation becomes pandering to their every whim.  This pandering is what they get day in / day out at club level and that clearly turns affable young men into monstrous sulking ogres with a whole bag of frozen Iceland chips on their shoulders.  It is never their fault, at club level it is always the ref, the opposition, bad luck, the fans getting on their backs etc etc.

The Premiership player is not programmed to accept responsbility, there are almost no consequences to even the worst actions. These delicate little flowers (delicate when it suits them, that is) want to talk and have their point heard, which is fine but the talk is cheap, it is rarely backed with action. And the talk of the England squad member is the most bargain bucket of any footballer at the bst of times.   As Rooney, seemingly now the second or third most deluded of these pound shop moaners, showed how completely out of touch he now is by complainaing of boos after the Algeria game.  Is it impossible for such cosseted individuals to accept or understand the reasons why they are booed?  As has been pointed out by many better commentators than I, they were booed because a lot of people had spent a lot of money and taken a lot of holiday to watch these players have a decent tournament, in line with expectation.  They don’t expect this bunch of players to win the World Cup but they do at least hope highly paid and trained professionals, who perform brilliantly for club, can manage the simple tasks like effort and competence.  The vast majority of England’s team have, seemimgly, been unable to.

But yet, we know, of course, that none of this failure is the footballer’s fault, we don’t understand. Outwardly they talk the talk but it’s what they have been told to say. The extra stuff that leaks out gives them away.  Excuses excuses, always the same.  First it was the altitude, then it was the ball, then it was press intrusion, now it’s when the team is picked and how it’s picked and how they train – allegedly.  Sorry chaps, it may well, minutely, be some of those things but it can’t be the manager’s methods.  After all, throughout qualifying, when you were winning, you loved them, he was a breath of fresh air, you loved the discipline of knowing who was boss.  Remember? He is doing very little different now.

I am uncertain how any of these factors can explain how Rooney goes from being a player with the best touch in England to a player unable to control the simplest of passes. I do know that the carping is endemic and must stop in order for anything t improve. Part of me hopes that England get knocked out on Wednesday, celebrating the success of this bunch of ingrates would require serious compromise.  At least if they get knocked out Fabio will resign and then unleash almighty vengeance by exposing the ludicrous demands, expectations and fragile egos of this hapless bunch of cuntbeaks.

Will it change anything? I suspect not but it might lead to more of a tabloid swing towards blame of players, rather than the likely Bolognese Head that will appear when we lose.  Fabio, like many of his immediate predecessorsget somne flack for the eneormous pile of cash they get to manage an international team. They clearly have to, it’s danger money in order to soften the blow of having to with these egomaniancs.

Like Fabio’s, the management style of the last three or four England managers has come under the spotlight after perceived player criticism.  Given the vast majority of those managers had a decent record one can only assume some other force is at play, maybe the players are not as good as they think they are or the FA is constantly employing the wrong men.  The latter is feasible but both Sven and Fabio were internationally renowned.  The former, however, is quite clearly a trend.  It’s funny that the same core of twats keeps having issues with managers’ style but yet only when they aren’t winning.

As is becoming the pattern, the players are now taking stick for being useless and they’ve clearly decided to castrate themsleves with the reason that it is because Fabio picks his team too late.   Much is made of the courage of the English footballer but it’s rarely in evidence in psychological terms in an England camp.  Long gone are the days when Psycho or Butcher (or even beckham!) will step up and take the lead by example.  This courage may sometimes manifest itself physically but where are the genuine guts, where are the massive cojones, where is the self respect, where is the pride?  There was very little of it on show in the last week.

Do we really want England to win the World Cup?  Can we really celebrate this bunch?  All will be forgotten of course, in that event, but the core of this team can easily be perceived as rotten.  John Terry, Frank Lampard, Steven Gerrard,  Ashley Cole and Wayne Rooney keep having the same old problems, it is becoming increasingly clear the people with the problem are the players and not the manager, or the ball, or the altitude … It is not even necessarily because they aren’t good enough, which they might not be, it’s simply because they are maladjusted young men who have been almost dehumansied by their clubs, the big clubs.  They are insufficiently balanced human beings and cannot cope with this scenario.

In my eyes, the only way to  change this is for Premier League managers to stop pandering to these millionaires, stop making excuses for them, stop protecting them in the face of the obvious error. Well, given that the manager is always the one who get’s the owner’s blame for failure, i can’t see why the player would take any notice o fthe manager so it has to come down to the owner. Except he’s not English, has lot sof money invested and wants blood, he doesn’t give a shite.

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In a short postscript I would just like to bash my usual target.  You’ll notice that it’s not just Terry and England in this tournament.  Deco’s had a pop at Key Hair Osh.  Anelka has clashed with Domenech … OK, Domenech is bonkers and Blanc was perhaps foollishly named his successor before this tournament began but he is still the manager and, whether you like him or not, presumably you have some professional pride and actually want to win the World Cup?  Or maybe not. My point being that these players all play for the same club team. And, talking of Terry, is this man the most deluded of all?.  Stripped of the England captaincy for nailing the mother of team mate’s child, he think he’s the obvious choice of leader to lay down a challenge to the England manager. He’s the manager John, do as you’re told and get on with it or go home.

Anti-Modern-Football.

No neutral really likes Chelsea and just as many are now sympathy fatigued by the shambles of Portsmouth. I suspect most would like to see a Pompey win but so few believe it possible they are unlikely to tune in unless the country is pounded with enough ash to make leaving the house impossible.

What’s it got going for it? Well, for a start there’s the lovely Ashley Cole … oh, hang on, we’ve been here before so let’s FFWD to Pompey … erm … why bother, it’s all been said.

Or has it? It’s easy to slate Chelsea and we certainly have in the past but what about Carlo? What about Joe Cole? What about Kalou? Where’s the harm there?

Among football’s many bankers, Joe is up there with the Co-Op for being one of the least offensive. Joe collects ornamental puppies and has a shelf full of pewter cups replete with dalmatian relief and corgi busts. When it comes to the FA Cup, Joe’s not had too much luck. He got subbed at half time in the 2007 final and busted up his knee against Southend in 2009. So, why not cheer for Joe the good guy? He looks a bit simple, he’s a bit small and Didier Drigba bullies him so we hope he scores a hatrick and gets his big face all over the papers.

Salomon Kalou is apparently another nice boy. Named after middle class walking shoes – a kind of Liberal sneaker, if you like, Sal is the friendly face of Chelsea’s front line. Kalou benefits from being neither Drogba nor Nicolas Anelka and so, of all the forwards at Chelsea, he finds himself in the unusual position of being the one no one despises.

And what of the gaffer? Well, he’s probably the only Premier League guv to pen and publish a treatise on dynamism and its role in the future of football. All the proceeds from his autobiography went towards research into amyotrophic lateral sclerosis! Those last two bits aren’t piss takes either. Believe it or not. This man deserves better than the players, owners and fans of this west London rabble.

The make up of Pompey’s transient team on matchday is more difficult to predict but we suspect recalls for Guy Whittingham, Martin Kuhl and Alans Knight and Biley, while more established stars can’t play because they would have to be paid.

Guy was an Admiral in the navy but after he retired he was more famous for being manager at Newport IoW and AFC Newbury both of whom nearly went bust under his tenure. He then rejoined Pompey as a coach and they promptly went into administration under the weight of insuring Guy’s vast cache of militaria. Whats not to like about the armed forces these days?

While playing for Pompey Alan Biley was in glam rock ensemble The Sweet and who doesn’t like pop classic ‘Blockbuster’? Martin Kuhl is cool.

We’ll not be watching this tedious dullfest where no one wins but as we are The Real FA Cup, we thought we should make a small effort. Instead we’re going to sit in a darkened gimp room with Sloth from Goonies and a pile of meeowmeeow. But we don’t need to watch because we know Lily Allen will be watching and she will no doubt sit and weep as her beloved Pompey succumb to the Chelsea machine.

Little fanfare will greet the six clubs who kick off this year’s festival on Friday the 14th August, which is a shame, but this website seeks to polish the trumpets, parp the trombones and generally give the less wealthy the opportunity to compose their own symphony of football. Get used to it, I shall crowbar many more of those in over the next few months

So, what does this year hold? You can put money on the magic of the cup continuing as the hardy perennial. What is the magic of the cup? It’s impossible to define, there is no over arching magic, everyone’s magic is different and personal.

Magic to me might well be the big-4-free affair of Bolton .v. Hull in the semi final, it certainly will be to the respective fans. I will thank god, or Roger Osborne as he is more affectionately known, it isn’t Chelsea against Man Utd, although of course that will be the other semi. But the nay-sayers will, no doubt, should the unlikely happen, moan about the lack of glamour in Hull .v. Bolton. Neither are ‘good’ enough to satisfy the bling lust of the average armchair fan but yet neither are they lowly enough to satisfy the ‘magic’ lust from the same armchair.

The big 4 semi though will of course be billed as game of the round, clash of the titans, prime time, SPLENDID SUNDAY and, of course, one will be the ‘eventual winners’. And the magic in that is where exactly? And herein lies the problem with the FA Cup and it’s relationship with modern fans and the modern media. Both would like a lower league side to get to the final but when they do it’s a shame they are going to get hammered, or if two lower league sides get to the final it’s not glamorous enough. Enough! Please, make up your mind. Do you want the magic or do you want Cristal and platinum plated teeth?

The real magic is rarely to be found in the final, the semi final and infrequently in the quarters. So where does this mystery lurk? We here at therealfacup are not battle hardened FA Cup experts but, if our experience last season is anything to go by, the magic lies in the first seven rounds. It’s the undiluted but half expected joy of Havant fans wryly predicting ‘it’s happening again’ after beating Crawley. It’s Oxhey Jets just being there, seeing as though they’ve only existed for about 30 years. And it’s hearing what it means to the players as you stand next to the touchline.

You can’t really describe these things, you have to experience them yourself and be one of the few hundred that will. A few more might read about that magic on blogs like this but only if the club responsible for that magic starts nudging the 3rd round will the comfily placed, judgemental millions hear about that magic via the conduit of a commentator who has read about it on a blog like this. Or, a commentator who has got their researcher to read about it on a blog like this.

To dredge up … errr … a thing … if a tree falls down in a wood and no one hears it, does it actually make a sound? That sound is the magic of the FA Cup. Of all the billions of magical noises that will be made in or about the FA Cup this season, the majority of the sounds will not be heard. Get out there and listen to them or they won’t actually have happened.

I have to admit I wasn’t really looking forward to this one, even if it was MY team. I dislike Chelsea more than I dislike Norwich and completely concurred with the ‘anti modern football’ flag clearly evident at the ground.

The Slug & Lettuce near the ground was rammed with Town fans high on the smack of a Big Four club, so much so I couldn’t find who I was supposed to meet. The beach balls were fun. What a morgue of an abortion of a ground of a haemorrhage of fans. I do have some rose tinted spectacles when it comes to football but Chelsea is all that is wrong with the game and part of the reason I wanted to watch some real stuff in the FA Cup and at non-league grounds. The gate Nazis frisked us upon entry, the back-packed, lager wallahs prowled the stands fleecing the gullible of their hand earned dollaz and the Chelsea fans sat there munching on crab salads or moaning about Scolari.

Ipswich were probably going to get killed here but they were going down singing, a rarity for Ipswich fans, at home games at least. It took Chelsea only 15 fairly dreary minutes to unlock Ipswich’s rearguard and it wasn’t the greatest of defending when the circumstances required it. Ballack touched in an easy goal and the crowd burbled for 10 seconds or so. However, Ipswich were having their moments and were not phased, nor outclassed. In fact, as the half wore on Ipswich started causing Chelsea some worrying moments. After about half an hour a dangerous Owen Garvan free kick eluded several expensive defenders and Steve Bruce’s not quite as good son buried the loose ball to equalise.

And within a minute of the restart the game’s defining moment arrived. Garvan and Jon Walters combined well in the Chelsea half to tee up Danny Haynes just outside the box. The central defenders were out of position and Cech was closer to his line than he should have been, this was the chance that would have turned the Chelsea fans from silent to angry. Haynes blasted it over the bar, not even troubling the man in the Goretex mask. By the end of the half, it was quite even, Ipswich perhaps even shaded it thanks to their strong finish and clearer chances.

The second half was, quite predictably, an entirely different story, although it still had its to and fro and Chelsea couldn’t quite get the final ball or, when they did, the Ipswich defence mostly dealt with it. It took two moments of undisputed class for West London’s bored to come to a semblance of life and see off the spirited efforts of the Championship club.

Chelsea’s second goal came from a brilliant Ballack free kick, given for a foul on Anelka but caused largely due to the reappearance of a surprisingly intent Didier Drogba who came on and started running at and bullying defenders. It was just what Chelsea needed but the game still had an end to end element with Chelsea looking the more likely to add to their score. This they did when not so fat Frank lashed another freekick into the corner from a seemingly unfeasible angle. Viewed later, on whatever ITV’s excuse for a highlights program is, it looked even better. Stamford Bridge creaked with relief more than anything and Ipswich gave a good account of themselves but, in the end, football lost again and another nail was drilled into its coffin. I don’t have the stomach to follow Chelsea so this is the end for me unless I get a ticket to one of the other games.