Pitch Talk Thursday Presents: Chapter Two-Why the Hell do the even Play the Carling Cup?

We’re back for Week Two of Pitch Talk Thursday, this week with the Champions League taking a week off we’ll delve into the homeless man’s FA Cup, The Carling Cup.

I want to start off with a little history lesson and a happy birthday. On this date in 1863 the Football Association or FA was created in the Freemasons' Tavern in Great Queen Street, London The creation of this organization some 143 years ago remains milepost number one in the world of organized football. Although the game that was played during this era doesn’t show much resemblance to the modern game it was on this date that the Beautiful Game was given life. Check out here and here for more information.

After a big weekend of excitement in the Premiership including the Devils 2-0 win at home versus the Reds of Liverpool and the Blues of Chelsea holding on to defeat the surprisingly strong Portsmouth 2-1, the heavy hitters of the Premiership embarked on the 3rd round qualifier for The Carling Cup.

Here’s a little background on The Carling Cup, or The League Cup as it is originally referred to. Here’s how it breaks down courtesy of our good friends at Wikipedia:

*Similar to the FA Cup (more on this in future Pitch Talks), but instead of 674 teams competing there is only 92, which consist of the 20 clubs of the Premiership and 72 clubs of The Football League (for more on the The Football League click here

*The winners of The Carling Cup qualify for the poor man’s Champions League in Europe called the UEFA Cup (more on this in future Pitch Talks) if they have not qualified for European play already

*Perhaps the least popular of all domestic cups because of the open play

*Named Carling Cup after corporate sponsorship and during the sponsorship of Worthington, was referred to as Worthless Cup

*The early rounds and late rounds are often used by top flight Premiership teams to utilize bench players and youth players in good tournament experience

*Has existed in similar capacity since 1961 and Liverpool tops the list of repeat winners with lucky number seven

Now, after having played down the importance of The Carling Cup, let’s get to Tuesday’s and Wednesday’s action.

We’ll start with the most dramatic of games with happened at The Alexandra Stadium when middle of the pack in League One (two leagues below Premiership) side: Crewe Alexandra took a Manchester United side to the 119th minute, one before penalty shootouts, before Kieran Lee put in the game winner as time expired as the Devils utilized a lineup complete with all backup players and youth side call ups to win 2-1 and advance to the 4th round.

The Spurs of Tottenham (Sports Guy’s pick) played a full side squad versus League Two (three leagues below Premiership) side: Milton Keynes Dons and felt good about a 5-0 victory as they try to gain some scoring momentum for the weekend.

Newcastle was lifted by young US striker, Giuseppe Rossi, on loan from Manchester United, over a Portsmouth side still reeling from the Stamford Bridge battle.

Chelsea, (fill in words here for meaningless description of how they rolled to a 2-0 win over a horrible Blackburn team)

And a surprise at “The Valley” as bottom-dwellers and future Championship Club Charlton Athletic upset third place Bolton as Marcus Bent scored the only goal to push Charlton on, (see, this is what The Carling Cup is all about, giving teams something to play for when all they have left is to fight relegation)

Finally, the other match of the day where defense was merely optional as the Reds of Liverpool, who like o win this tournament as mentioned above, won a shootout with Reading 4-3 as the Crouchatron scored the eventual winner in the 77th minute as Reading came back with three goals in 10 minutes late to make it interesting. If you like to see high scoring affairs with little defense, set your channels to Liverpool matches for the rest of the year.

So that’s it for Pitch Talk Thursday, for those of you that like the round ball I hope it was worth it for those who don’t, well you probably haven’t made it to this point. We’ll be back next week following Matchday 4 in The Champions League to update where we’re at who’s headed to the UEFA Cup.

Cheers