Daniel Storey: FA Cup avoids farce but Marine scene not good enough

Mounted police control the crowds outside Rossett Park, Crosby, before the FA Cup third round match between Marine and Tottenham. Picture: Clive Brunskill/PA

No doubt that the FA Cup provides Premier League headaches…

It is not the fault of the FA Cup or even solely the Football Association that the competition presents itself as a headache for Premier League managers.

There should have been far greater forward planning on the part of English football’s governing bodies about the potential for a packed schedule as we enter the final months of the season.

If the new strain of Covid-19 was not entirely predictable, a second wave over the winter months certainly was. The only change to the usual calendar was the scrapping of FA Cup replays, one-leg EFL Cup semi-finals, and a shorter window in which to fit every game with the season starting late and needing to finish on time with a postponed European Championship to follow. 

Cancelling the domestic cups to create leeway for cancelled Covid-affected matches was the sensible move. Instead we have an emergency situation with no easy answers and an entire sport left crossing their fingers that a scheduling disaster is averted.

... But concerns over potential farces were unfounded

That said, this was not a non-event FA Cup third round as we had feared. When Aston Villa selected a starting XI packed with teenagers we worried about Liverpool running riot and demeaning the competitive nature of the competition. In fact, Villa’s youngsters stepped up to earn deserved praise.

In fact, the teams picked by Premier League teams were far stronger than expected; Jurgen Klopp was not the only manager to give first-teamers a run out. Kevin de Bruyne, Gabriel Jesus, Timo Werner, Kai Havertz and Hakim Ziyech all started on Sunday lunchtime at home to lower-league opponents. Tottenham too gave Marine a day to remember with their own strong selection.

Minnows secure their long-term future

If the domestic cups had indeed been cancelled for the season, the prize money would presumably have been shared equally between the clubs that needed it most.

But the competition being played has given a lifeline to those clubs who have made it work for them.

Chorley took advantage of Derby County’s Covid crisis by eliminating a Championship club. Manager Jamie Vermiglio estimates that the club’s run to the fourth round will earn them up to £500,000. That is enough not just to stave off the threat of financial doom but to allow the club to grow over the next few years.

The same is true of Marine, an eight-tier club that will reap the financial rewards of hosting Tottenham even without the gate receipts that would have been provided by supporters being present. For these clubs, the FA Cup has become an economic lifeline that will make a long-term difference. For that reason, we must be pleased that it has proceeded as planned.

Allardyce takes another step in the wrong direction

It was always going to take Sam Allardyce time to turn around a ship that was heading for the iceberg. The brutal truth is that West Brom do not have Premier League-standard defenders. 

The January transfer window will prove crucial to Allardyce. But West Brom’s new manager also knew that he could ill-afford for the rot to set in under his management. 

If the 1-1 draw at Anfield provided hope of defensive resilience, the Baggies have conceded 14 goals in their other four matches. West Brom conceded three or more goals in four of their 65 matches under Slaven Bilic. They have done so in three of their five under Allardyce.

On Saturday, West Brom allowed a Blackpool team that has won one of its last five League One matches to have 17 shots, score twice and eliminate them on penalties.

West Brom were not at full-strength, but then this was not a scratch team and Blackpool also made changes.

Make no mistake: This was another significant step in the wrong direction.

Leeds produce dismal display as Crawley slay the giants

Crawley might have claimed that their signing of reality TV star (and former non-league footballer) Mark Wright was not a publicity stunt, but the cynicism alarm rings loud. Thankfully, few will be talking about Wright’s late substitute appearance after League Two Crawley dismantled Leeds United to sail into the fourth round.

Leeds were utterly abject, a performance in which goalkeeper Kiko Casilla set the tone. There is a higher section of Leeds supporters who believe Casilla should never play for the club again after failing to apologise for racially abusing Jonathan Leko. Perhaps karma merely does not have a sell-by date.

Marcelo Bielsa has long railed against the notion that Leeds’ players get fatigued in the second half of their seasons, but if that wasn’t the explanation for a total abdication of professionalism and invention then it suggests his players simply weren’t up for their fixture. That is damning in itself.

Forgive me for the moan, but…

I have spent almost all of the last 10 months inside. I haven’t been inside a shop and have left the village in which I live fewer than five times, only to stand in the garden of someone I desperately want to embrace.

So to see hundreds of locals gathering outside Marine’s ground before the arrival of Tottenham Hotspur, with police seemingly trying to control their behaviour rather than send them home, angered me intensely. It seems unlikely that the magic of the FA Cup is any match for Covid-19.

This gives football a bad name. It gives credence to the theory that postponing or cancelling the season would help aid a restorative process that extends far beyond sport.

I understand that football is special; it isn’t that special.