Saturday, apparently, marked a watershed of cup competition based tediousness, with absolutely nothing of note happening, until the Reading/ Liverpool game, where, actually come to think, nothing much of note happened there either, but at least they got a few through the doors.
To quickly recap: weakened teams across the country, even weaker than usual in Blackburn’s case, played out a series of dull and eventless fixtures to predictable and middling outcomes. A home win here, a replay a week on Wednesday there. West Brom won, as did Manchester City and I think Stoke did too, though don’t quote me on that. I’d have to double check.
Shockingly low crowds too, even if they do allow us to put the Aston Villa and Middlesbrough numbers together and count that as one, which I don’t think they will. The attendance at Wigan for their game against Hull, 5,335, was especially worthy of comment. Put it like this: when Newcastle United changed the name of their stadium, they were titters along the lines that they now play at an email address. They will take heart in that fact that, unlike Wigan yesterday, they are yet to play to a crowd with fewer people in it than the average Hotmail contact list.
The shock, as it was, was one of your common or garden, low wattage variety of shocks, the type kids at school give to each other using low voltage batteries. The news of Coventry’s draw at Portsmouth drew nothing, on Radio 5, but dim acknowledgement that there had been a game at Fratton Park that afternoon and that yes... it had indeed finished 1-1. At one point it was described as a ‘credible’ result for Coventry, presumably to the embarrassment of the person getting out the bunting and the champagne still left over from New Year’s Eve.
We were, as a nation, left profoundly unmoved and it led to the inevitable talk of a ‘bad draw’. It seemed hard to disagree. It’s fair to suggest that Sunderland’s game against Barrow, say, would have worked better, as a plot device, had the Non League side been at home. For one thing we may have had a shot at getting a bigger crowd in. And for another, it would have given Barrow a bit more of a chance. There may have even been a famous upset- which would have been ideal, obviously, particularly for those of us that don’t support Sunderland.
It took us back to Jose Mourhino and the time when he, then managing Chelsea, suggested that the Premiership teams should always be away in the early rounds to help preserve whatever fleeting notions of ‘romance’ mad people often want to ascribe the FA Cup. This was, to my mind, the exact moment Mourinho lurched into a hapless self parody from which he is yet to fully escape. But, however many years later, the plan got some tentative backing on 606 last night too. Which I can only imagine touching Jose- assuming, anyway, that you can access Radio 5’s listen live function in Milan and also that his plans for dinner had fallen through and he was at a bit of a loose end as to what to do with himself.
But surely, if we are to disregard the concept of The FA Cup as a competition and view it as more an arc based and juicy narrative- if we are so lustful for magic that we are willing to dispense with one of the key components of both the magic and the cup itself (the luck of the draw) - this big team away from home idea is a bit of a weasely compromise. I say go the whole hog, and for each stage of the competition invite a different auteur from stage or screen to give the weekend their own distinctive touch.
For the first three rounds, you will have your own thoughts. But the name I keep coming back to is Ken Loach. His brand of gritty, kitchen sink realism would be the perfect mood setter for the early stages and the heavy involvement of the non league clubs for whom a gritty kitchen sink would actually represent a marked improvement in facilities.
Improvisation would be encouraged, which would make pre and post match team talks fiery, if not strictly decipherable, and which would hopefully mean an end to those goal celebration clearly conceived to award the scoring team lengthy coverage on the evening’s highlight show.
Unfortunately, according to Wikipedia, Loach always shoots scenes in order, believing it only fair to the actor. I’m thinking aloud here, but this method of filming would rather scupper my other idea to spruce up the cup: play the final first, sometime in June, and leave the rest of the competition a mad scramble to draw, and then defeat the winner, thus claiming their crown as your own. But that one needed a bit of work anyway, in all honesty.
The quirk factor in rounds three through five could be ramped up by the hiring of Diablo Cody, writer of Juno and that other one, the one that’s a bit like Juno. What others struggle to say using believable dialogue, Cody is content to say using a vaguely ironic soundtrack and deathly unfunny pop culture references. Luckily, ITV’s punditry panel is perhaps the only place in this galaxy- or in any other far, far away ones- that would be improved by a five minute segment of snarking centred on the plot holes in the original Star Wars trilogy. Or, at least, not unduly hindered by it.
For the quarters to the final, well, I say go all out, and get Russell Davies, now formerly of Doctor Who. Per David Tennat’s last episode, we could expect most games to overrun by a good twenty or twenty five minutes. And it seems unlikely we would make it through the entirety of the final without at least one cameo by Billie Piper. But, on the plus side, where nowadays we have to content ourselves moaning on and on about close offside calls, with Davies at the helm we would be left debating the feasibility of a late twist involving a Time Lord coming on off the bench and saving the game for Bolton Wanderers. This, appropriately enough I suppose, seems like infinitely more fun and less like a gigantic waste of time.
It also offers the thrilling prospect of Alan Green- whose attempts to project an aloof incomprehension whenever Twitter is brought up on his show grow ever more strained- being forced to get to grips with and his head around a sonic screwdriver, at least one romantic subplot, and an alien baddie crossed over from The Sarah Jane Adventures.
Something needed to be done, and then Sunday and Leeds at Old Trafford, and, somehow, without any outside manipulation or a ludicrous bit of ret-conning, something was done. Leeds were excellent. Robust in defence, and slick in attack, they harried and chased with a zest so composed they could have been a stain removing washing powder. At one point, around the sixtieth minute mark, I almost forgot that they were, you know, Leeds United.
“Leeds are back,” sang their fans, and for a mad moment you believed them. Then, for a further mad moment, you wondered if this need necessarily be such a bad thing. It does things to you, this competition, and not always good things. Perhaps we’re best not pressuring it to do these thing when it simply doesn’t feel like it and being aware that it may choose to do them when we least want it to.
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