Cup competitions in a typical muddle

If there's one thing that we've come to expect from the National League's management committee over the past few years, it's the unexpected. Anything and everything appears to be on the table when they sit around it, and no sooner have the various members left Merrion Square for home than the managers of the clubs they represent are expressing their disappointment about the decisions taken.

Last week, for instance, Dundalk's manager, Jim McLaughlin, was critical of the switch to twolegged semi-finals for this season's League Cup. Like its English and Scottish counterparts, the League Cup here is not the most important of competitions, and McLaughlin felt that its latter stages dragged on quite enough already without opting to decide the finalists on a home and away basis.

In fairness, the competition serves a far more useful purpose here than in England, where it has edged towards collapse, the victim of the continuing power struggle at the top of the game. In Ireland, the pre-season group stages appear to suit most clubs down to the ground, providing, as they do, a fairly competitive environment in which to finalise preparations for the season proper and even to size up potential signings.

Sligo Rovers, who travel to Whitehall for the first leg of the first semi-final this evening, have fared reasonably well in the Premier Division. But a sizeable proportion of the panel Nicky Reid has at his disposal now were probably oblivious to the fact that they would ever be taking the slow train to the Showgrounds when this year's competition began in August.

Shamrock Rovers, who subsequently made a strong start to the league, were without a number of first team players due to injury and managed just one draw from their three outings, while Derry gave a more accurate taste of the early league form to follow by achieving a similar record against Sligo, Finn Harps and Fanad. Nobody seemed to mind very much.

Now that the league is in full swing, however, three clubs with aspirations towards the title and one anxious to achieve promotion are expected to divert their attention back to the Cup, and not for just a one-off tie either. It's taken 12 weeks to reduce eight teams to four, and up in Merrion Square they're determined to take their time over halving the number again.

Representatives of all four clubs were, reportedly, in favour of the extra games, but the managers now face the option of either ripping off those fans who do turn up for the games, in the same way that has become common in the English competition, or risk losing key players to injury for more important league matches. It's all rather disappointing at a time when the talk around the league is of getting the "product" right.

How, precisely, those people who realise the game's most important competition needs strengthening can agree to have it undermined in this way remains a mystery. Is the few hundred pounds in gate money really worth it? And could the income not be increased by simply sorting out the structure of the competition once and for all, taking full account of its position within the game, and then sticking to it?

It's remarkable to think that only a couple of years ago it was briefly agreed, before the management committee regained control of its senses, to reduce the number of league matches for each club in order to greatly expand the League Cup. What could they have been thinking of?

What's particularly bewildering about this latest decision is that it comes in the season after the far more important FAI Cup was vandalised by the introduction of extra time into ties before there had been the opportunity for a replay. This, we were told, was in order to ease fixture congestion and take pressure off the bigger clubs. Most of the leading managers duly welcomed it.

Thus Garda and Limerick were denied the replays they deserved after finishing level at the end of 90 minutes with Drogheda United and Shamrock Rovers respectively. The chance of a non-league team causing an upset were markedly reduced, and key games, such as the visit of Cork to Derry in the quarter-finals, were completely devalued by the prospect of extra time. Cork rarely looked like scoring that day, but it took the home side until the last couple of minutes to find the net themselves.

Had Derry been taken to within 90 seconds of having to travel to Turner's Cross it would have been exciting to watch; as it was, there was simply a feeling that it's now or iin extra time. Either way, the outcome seemed inevitable.

The move also had the side-effect of encouraging newspapers to reduce the amount of space allocated to Friday evening games. Extra time could leave large chunks of Saturday's sports pages empty until uncomfortably close to deadlines, and there seemed little reason to leave any more space hanging than absolutely necessary.

Reversing the changes ahead of this year's competition would, as in the League Cup, reinforce the impression that the people who make the rules have no firm convictions about the best way to run our game. Unfortunately, as so often, failing to do so would be even more damaging.