The oldest championship in England – FA Cup. The qualifying round has already begun – watch every game of FA Cup Live Online.
The Football Association Challenge Cup, commonly known as the FA Cup, is a knockout cup competition in English football, run by and named after The Football Association.
The FA Cup is the oldest football competition in the world, starting in 1871-72.
A record 762 teams have been accepted into the cup for 2008-2009, beating the previous record of 731 teams accepted into the FA Cup in 2007-08. In comparison, the League Cup can involve only the 72 members of The Football League (which organises that competition) and the 20 teams in the Premier League for a total of 92 eligible teams.
The holders of the FA Cup are Portsmouth, who beat Cardiff City 1-0 in the 2008 final on 17 May 2008. This is the first time that a team from outside the 'top four' (Liverpool, Manchester United, Chelsea, and Arsenal) has won the FA Cup in 13 years.
As well as being presented with the cup, the winning team also qualifies by right for the first round of the UEFA Cup, unless they have already qualified for Europe in which case the position goes to the runners-up or to the highest placed Premier League side without European qualification.
Format
The Cup involves clubs in the English football league system. In the early years other teams from Wales, Ireland and Scotland also took part in the competition with Glasgow side Queen's Park. Six Welsh clubs that currently play in the English football league system compete in the FA Cup: Cardiff City, Swansea City, Wrexham, Merthyr Tydfil, Newport County and Colwyn Bay.
The competition is a knockout tournament. The qualifying round draws are regionalised to reduce the travel costs of smaller non-league sides. Rounds one and two were also previously split into northern and southern draw sections. The draw also determines which team will play at home. Drawn replays are now settled with extra time and penalty shootouts.
All Premier League and Football League clubs may enter. Non-league clubs may also enter if they competed in the previous season's FA Cup, FA Trophy, or FA Vase competition and are deemed to be playing in an "acceptable" league for the current season. All clubs entering the competition must have a suitable stadium.
The competition begins in August with the extra preliminary round contested by clubs occupying a low position in the English football league system, and the preliminary round. There are then four qualifying rounds and six rounds of the competition proper, followed by the semi-finals and the final.
Clubs higher up the league system are exempt from certain rounds. The FA Cup has had a very set pattern for a long time of when each round is played. Normally the first round is played in mid-November, with the second round on one of the first two Saturdays in December. The third round is played at the start of January, with the fourth round later in the month and fifth round staged in mid-February.
The winning team qualifies by right for the first round of the UEFA Cup. If the winners also qualify for the Champions League by merit of league position, the runners-up qualify for the UEFA Cup in their place. If both finalists qualify for the Champions League, an extra UEFA Cup place is given on the basis of league position.
Venues
Matches in theFA Cup are usually played at the home ground of one of the two teams. The team who plays at home is decided when the matches are drawn.
Traditionally, the FA Cup Final was played at London's Wembley Stadium. Early finals were played in other locations and, due to extensive redevelopment of Wembley, finals between 2001 and 2006 were played at Millennium Stadium in Cardiff.
The semi-finals are contested at neutral venues; in the past these have usually been the home grounds of teams not involved in that semi-final.
Trophies
At the end of the final, the winning team is presented with a trophy, also known as the "FA Cup", which they hold until the following year's final. Individual members of the teams playing in the final are presented with winners' and runners'-up medals. The present FA Cup trophy is the fourth. The first, the 'little tin idol', was used from the inception of the Cup in 1871-2.
The FA fined Villa £25 to pay for a replacement. Almost 60 years later, the thief admitted that the cup had been melted down to make counterfeit half-crowns. The second trophy was a replica of the first, and was last used in 1910 before being presented to the FA's long-serving president Lord Kinnaird.
A new, larger, trophy was bought by the FA in 1911 designed and manufactured by Fattorini's of Bradford and won by Bradford City in its first outing, the only time a team from Bradford has reached the final.
Sponsorship
- 1995-1998 Littlewoods
- 1999-2002 AXA
- 2003-2006 The FA Partners: Carlsberg, McDonald's, Nationwide, Pepsi, Umbro
- 2006-2010 E.ON (Official Sponsor):
Supporters (Carlsberg, Umbro and National Express)
Notable events in the FA Cup
Three clubs have won consecutive FA Cups on more than one occasion: Wanderers (1872, 1873 and 1876, 1877, 1878), Blackburn Rovers (1884, 1885, 1886 and 1890, 1891), and Tottenham Hotspur (1961, 1962 and 1981, 1982).
Six clubs have won the FA Cup as part of a League and Cup double:
- Preston North End (1889)
- Aston Villa (1897)
- Tottenham Hotspur F.C. (1961)
- Arsenal (1971, 1998, 2002)
- Liverpool (1986)
- Manchester United (1994, 1996, 1999)
Arsenal and Manchester United share the record of three doubles.
West Bromwich Albion are the only team to date to win the FA Cup and promotion in the same season-in 1930-31.
In 1993, Arsenal became the first side to win both the FA Cup and League Cup in the same season, beating Sheffield Wednesday 2-1, in both finals. Liverpool repeated this feat in 2001, as did Chelsea in 2007.
In 2001, Liverpool won the FA Cup, League Cup and UEFA Cup to complete a cup treble.
Portsmouth have the unusual accolade of holding the FA Cup for the longest consecutive time due to the second world war.
The FA Cup has only been won by a non-English team once in its history, Cardiff City were the club to achieve this in 1927. They made it to the final only to lose to Portsmouth in 2008.