How to save the FA Cup....

[arbboy]

Champs League spot for the winner is a good idea.  Personally I don't like that you can finish 3rd or 4th and end up in a Champions League, seems illogical to me.    Give the 3rd PL CL spot to the FA Cup winner and the 4th PL CL slot to the League Cup winner.  Make both cups interesting again.

Nice idea romantic wise.  Will never happen in reality because it will affect the english co-efficient too much potentially and might cause us to lose one of the 4 spots with potential poor teams binking a cup and being totally out of their depth in Champions league.

[DungBeetle]

Champs League spot for the winner is a good idea.  Personally I don't like that you can finish 3rd or 4th and end up in a Champions League, seems illogical to me.    Give the 3rd PL CL spot to the FA Cup winner and the 4th PL CL slot to the League Cup winner.  Make both cups interesting again.

Nice idea romantic wise.  Will never happen in reality because it will affect the english co-efficient too much potentially and might cause us to lose one of the 4 spots with potential poor teams binking a cup and being totally out of their depth in Champions league.

The big boys are doing a good job in their own right of losing the 4th spot in recent years!

[The Camel]

Far too much football these days IMO.

Scrap the group stages of the CL and the League Cup.

Would immediately make the FA Cup more interesting.

[Tal]

Champs League spot for the winner is a good idea.  Personally I don't like that you can finish 3rd or 4th and end up in a Champions League, seems illogical to me.    Give the 3rd PL CL spot to the FA Cup winner and the 4th PL CL slot to the League Cup winner.  Make both cups interesting again.

Nice idea romantic wise.  Will never happen in reality because it will affect the english co-efficient too much potentially and might cause us to lose one of the 4 spots with potential poor teams binking a cup and being totally out of their depth in Champions league.

Arry's Portsmouth in the Champions League?!

What about Wigan winning it and going down? Or McLeish's Birmingham City?

I quite like the idea of 6 bonus points. In the Prem, that could be £5m in TV money alone. Could keep a team up or win them the league.

[david3103]

Champs League spot for the winner is a good idea.  Personally I don't like that you can finish 3rd or 4th and end up in a Champions League, seems illogical to me.    Give the 3rd PL CL spot to the FA Cup winner and the 4th PL CL slot to the League Cup winner.  Make both cups interesting again.

Nice idea romantic wise.  Will never happen in reality because it will affect the english co-efficient too much potentially and might cause us to lose one of the 4 spots with potential poor teams binking a cup and being totally out of their depth in Champions league.

Arry's Portsmouth in the Champions League?!

What about Wigan winning it and going down? Or McLeish's Birmingham City?

I quite like the idea of 6 bonus points. In the Prem, that could be £5m in TV money alone. Could keep a team up or win them the league.

Not sure if serious.

How on earth can you countenance a League position being decided by a Cup match?
What happens if a Championship team wins the cup?

[Doobs]

Love both cups as a Bradford city fan.  I'd say we can definitely lose the league cup though.  I don't think the FA cup has lost much.  When the final comes round, you don't get many fans of the finalists going I can't be arsed with this.  If some teams want to take it easier in the 3rd round, it simply doesn't bother me, and gives us more of a chance, gives smaller teams the opportunity to share some of the wealth etc.  There just doesn't seem much wrong to me.

[George2Loose]

Stop referring to the "magic of the FA cup" grows tiresome.

I just don't think it's the big boys who don't value it anymore. As a fan international weeks and FA weeks just aren't as appealing as a full PL fixture list

[Graham C]

Arry's Portsmouth in the Champions League?!

What about Wigan winning it and going down? Or McLeish's Birmingham City?

Honestly, why not?  Chances are they don't win if the big boys take it seriously.  I don't see why not regardless, spread some of the wealth.   All had been in the Prem or were Prem teams at the time, you're going to say they can't be in the CL if they finished 4th or better?   Are you going to tell Tighty Leicester can't be in the CL next season?

[arbboy]

At which stage does the FA cup require change?  Up to the 3rd round nothing has changed imo in the last 40 years and every club involved pre 3rd round loves the event as much as ever.  3rd round is the dream round for most of the teams in it.  I think the only potential issue is too many games are not played at 3pm Saturday for whatever reason.  4th round onwards it is taken pretty seriously by virtually every club.  Semis will always be played at Wembley now just because of finances of paying off the cost of building the new Wembley.  The FA are never going to change that rule.

The final itself probably needs to be made more of a stand alone all day event on TV like it was in the 1980's.  

There is very little that needs changing with the FA cup imo.

As for giving a Champs League spot to the winner i am pretty sure UEFA wouldn't allow this even if the FA did.

[booder]

At which stage does the FA cup require change?  Up to the 3rd round nothing has changed imo in the last 40 years and every club involved pre 3rd round loves the event as much as ever.  3rd round is the dream round for most of the teams in it.  I think the only potential issue is too many games are not played at 3pm Saturday for whatever reason.  4th round onwards it is taken pretty seriously by virtually every club.  Semis will always be played at Wembley now just because of finances of paying off the cost of building the new Wembley.  The FA are never going to change that rule.

The final itself probably needs to be made more of a stand alone all day event on TV like it was in the 1980's.  

There is very little that needs changing with the FA cup imo.

As for giving a Champs League spot to the winner i am pretty sure UEFA wouldn't allow this even if the FA did.

This for me.

[Sheriff Fatman]

I watched my team lose to a non-league side this year, so the FA Cup doesn't need anything changing structurally to retain everything that makes it special, IMO.

Something's I would do though:

Bring back replays, especially for the Final, and the possibility of second replays.

Play the semi-finals at the Millenium Stadium, rather than Wembley.  Even though I benefitted from seeing a Wembley semi-final in 2008, it did feel a bit like the game didn't belong there.

I agree that the final needs to be a 3pm kickoff on a Saturday after the Premier League season has ended, so I'd make that change of the 6 suggested.

The draw needs to stay totally random.  I think competitions such as the Champions League should go back to this, at least for the knockout stages.

Much as I like the idea of seeing full-strength Premier League teams playing, I don't see a practical way to make this enforceable.  Typically, you still end up facing a team full of internationals when the reserve sides are played anyway.

The much bigger fix is needed to the whole League structure as the financial imbalance between Premier League and Football League is getting worse with every passing season.  The Championship is now a league of 'have parachute payments' or 'don't have parachute payment' teams which makes it virtually impossible for a genuine fairytale story to occur anymore (even Bournemouth last season needed massive financial backing, despite them being a 'small' club in infrastructure).

[Ledders]

"BBC to show Exeter v Liverpool on Friday Jan 8 from 7.55pm. Last train back to Liverpool that day? 6.25pm"

Not doing things like this might be a start.

[The Camel]

I watched my team lose to a non-league side this year, so the FA Cup doesn't need anything changing structurally to retain everything that makes it special, IMO.

Something's I would do though:

Bring back replays, especially for the Final, and the possibility of second replays.

Play the semi-finals at the Millenium Stadium, rather than Wembley.  Even though I benefitted from seeing a Wembley semi-final in 2008, it did feel a bit like the game didn't belong there.

I agree that the final needs to be a 3pm kickoff on a Saturday after the Premier League season has ended, so I'd make that change of the 6 suggested.

The draw needs to stay totally random.  I think competitions such as the Champions League should go back to this, at least for the knockout stages.

Much as I like the idea of seeing full-strength Premier League teams playing, I don't see a practical way to make this enforceable.  Typically, you still end up facing a team full of internationals when the reserve sides are played anyway.

The much bigger fix is needed to the whole League structure as the financial imbalance between Premier League and Football League is getting worse with every passing season.  The Championship is now a league of 'have parachute payments' or 'don't have parachute payment' teams which makes it virtually impossible for a genuine fairytale story to occur anymore (even Bournemouth last season needed massive financial backing, despite them being a 'small' club in infrastructure).

Disagree with the bolded bit.

The Champions League groups stage fatures a lot of uncompetitive and dull games as it is, there has to be an advantage for finishing top rather than second or even more games will have nothing at stake.

[Archer]

"BBC to show Exeter v Liverpool on Friday Jan 8 from 7.55pm. Last train back to Liverpool that day? 6.25pm"

Not doing things like this might be a start.

Don't see the problem. The majority of Liverpool fans will be happy it's on TV and they get to watch it rather than being 1 of the majority of games that aren't on TV and kick-off at 3pm on the Saturday.

Apparently, if it was a 3pm kick off on the Saturday they still miss the last train back to Liverpool because it is earlier at weekends..