The uncertainty over the future of the Setanta Sports Cup appears to have be cleared up today with the news that the draw for this year's tournament will take place on 28 July in Abbotstown.
More here.
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The uncertainty over the future of the Setanta Sports Cup appears to have be cleared up today with the news that the draw for this year's tournament will take place on 28 July in Abbotstown.
More here.
It will be interesting to hear if the prize money remains unaltered.
Despite reduced money for the top end, the incentive will still be there as there was the chance of no money at all from it before now. Great that it's going ahead.
With respect, Linfield and Glentoran were opening hostile to the tournament last season and played reserve teams in a number of matches with big money for the winners and runners-up. I don't think the Northern clubs will give the competition the time of day if the level of funding is reduced in any significant way.
Great news for the clubs involved.
Great to see that the Setanta Cup will be going ahead. Hopefully now we'll still be around to take part in the competition.
With respect - bar a single exception every year, the Irish League clubs are sh!t in the Setanta and don't get very far anyway.
They don't take Europe very seriously either, despite the significant income available there even if you only progress one round (e.g. 90k sterling in Europa League).
Let's just be honest here - the Irish League clubs don't take anything seriously outside of their own Belfast and District League. They've whinged non-stop about the Setanta since it began, so I don't expect anything would change that for them.
There's a bit of a contradiction here, surely?
When you accuse IL clubs of "not taking Setanta [or Europe] seriously", that implies that they could be competitive, but choose not to.
Yet the received wisdom generally is that bar one or two teams, IL clubs are simply not good enough to compete with their LOI [European] counterparts.
Which is it?
For if IL simply aren't good enough, then it arguably makes sense to concentrate on what they do well, rather than on games where the difference between "serious" and "not bothered" is a 2-0 defeat or a 4-0 defeat.
After all, whilst the standard in domestic games may be low, that does not prevent those games being tolerably attractive, on the grounds that they are at least competitive and hard-fought etc.
That 90k figure is significantly increased from even a couple of years ago btw, nonetheless, how come so many (most?) of those LOI clubs who have won decent European prize money in recent years are now so strapped for cash?
As Stamullendrog alludes, perhaps the pursuit of prize money will actually prove to have cost some LOI clubs, insofar as they have overreached themselves?
I sense that you are keen to do the IL down in a manner that makes your opening "With respect" anything but!
Anyhow, imo it is misleading/unhelpful to deal in the sorts of generalisation as you do i.e. your implication that all IL clubs take the same attitude as each other, to both Europe and Setanta, for the same reasons, and from the same circumstances.
Taking Europe this season, for example, imo the worst IL performances were by Distillery. My explanation for this is that Distillery were actually "punching above their weight" in even qualifying for Europe, this being the culmination of a very able manager's 15 year(?) reign at Ballyskeagh (Paul Kirk).
Then when Kirk was pushed out in the close season following a Boardroom coup, this caused a number of top players to clear off, leaving the club in absolute disarray.
Different again were Glentoran and Crusaders, with the former clearly not taking Europe seriously and up against a top team, whereas Crues are on a bit of a roll, and clearly fancied their chances against more modest opposition.
Yet if you look at Setanta, the Glens went on a very good run last time out, falling only at the final hurdle in very difficult circumstances.
On which point I'd say the fact that IL clubs have "whinged" about Setanta, but not about Europe, is actually a reflection that they do care to see the former run fairly and properly, even if they don't expect much in the latter.
After all, if an IL club were eg to receive home advantage in the Final and actually win the Setanta this season, the winner's prize money might make the difference between, say, Examinership and survival...;)
Lads, there are tons and tons of Derry v the Irish league threads around. Don't let this one turn into anopther one. If you want to reply dcfcsteve, PM EalingGreen, or post in the dozens of threads in the Irish league section
In all fairness Glentoran had no chance against Maccabi Haifa. Crusaders certainly tried against Rabotnicki. They got a goal in the 90th minute to keep the tie at 1-1. They stand the same chance as St Pats for qualifying.
It's more teams like Lisburn who get thrashed to a Georgian team 11-1 that gives the idea they couldn't be arsed.
Indeed there was more to it than that, for Crues had to play the last 25 minutes with 10 men, having had their Captain, Colin Coates, sent off. They then got a Penalty in the 89th minute but only hit the bar with it, but still kept going to get the equaliser in injury time.
Getting back to the Setanta, I'm sure they'd have put up a better show than eg either of Coleraine or Cliftonville, yet they don't qualify, despite having won the Irish Cup and finished 3rd in the League for 2008-09...:eek:
Still, perhaps I'd better not complain too much, otherwise DCFC Steve will cite it as more evidence of IL-types "whinging non-stop about the Setanta since it began" ;)
According to the mirror the total prize money for this years cup is €250k. The winners prize of €150k will be 'significantly reduced'.
Better than nothing though.
Well when they won/qualified, they were under the impression that it would be starting at the usual time, february/march, so in that context it made sense.
Moving it to August screwed it up for them as now they have to either skip a year, or always be 15 months behind.Hard to tell a team who've qualified we're skipping a year though.
Quote:
Originally Posted by micls http://foot.ie/forums/images/buttons/viewpost.gif
Its the 07/08 qualifiers that will play this one I think?
Very complicated
Coleraine have qualified by virtue of losing the 07/08 Irish cup final to league champions Linfield. if they had played last season in the Setanta Cup probably wouldnt have done great as the rest of their season wasnt up to much but having made a few interesting signings recently may make a better go of it this time. The time lag between qualifying and playing may have actually done them a favour.
Anybody know roughly the prize-pool percentage brakedown for each stage of the competition?
With Cork City looking likely to go out of business, does this mean it goes back to 2 groups of 4 ?
People who were in it last year...was the draw live on tv or just put up on their website?
Dundalk could be thrown into it as winners of the first division? Just throwing it out there..
No i just remember a while back there was a play-off between League cup winners and First division winners for a place in setanta cup.. so i was just wondering like..
Sure who else would you invite?
Why is everyone assuming a LOI team would take Corks place?
Interesting question.
Perhaps the IL and LOI should each nominate a club to play in a two-leg qualifier (H & A), with the winner going through as the ninth team?
I assume there should be time (just) and it might create a little bit of interest as a "curtain raiser".
Mind you, if the IL club were the winner, how would it be received South of the border that there would be 6 NI clubs out of 9 in the competition (5 IL + DCFC)?
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/...251492116.html
I am very surprised to see this being mentioned in the IT today. A bit excited, but also very wary on our behalf.Quote:
In the event that the worst does come to pass, however, Bray may well replace Cork in the Setanta Cup on the basis of their league position at the end of last season while all of City’s results from the current league campaign would be expunged.
Following the Marney affair and the arbitration crap etc between Pats, Shels and the league and the FAI, Setanta were very carefull when they setup the Setanta Cup.
I have seen a copy of the Setanta rules and they state that entry is by invitation only and they have the final decision on everything so in theory they can invite in whoever they want to replace Cork if they fold.
On the league table from last season Bray would get in, but I think commrecially they'd prefer to have Rovers in it.
Will be interesting to see what they decide to do!
bhs