Jeff Stelling has bemoaned the open draw format of the FA Cup which led to Liverpool being handed a trip to Arsenal in the third round of the competition when the fixtures were drawn on Sunday.
One of the Premier League’s current top two will instantly crash out of the tournament next month, although the former Sky Sports presenter’s gripe isn’t with the swift felling of a big name, but rather the missed opportunity for unique pairings to be formed and the lower league teams to get valuable income from TV coverage.
Speaking on talkSPORT (via The Mirror), the 68-year-old said: “I’m not interested in Arsenal against Liverpool in the FA Cup, I see it in the Premier League, not interested at all.
“What worries me is some of the smaller teams who get through to this stage. You look at Eastleigh and Maidstone, they played five games to get to this stage and they are looking for a bumper payday, and what happens? They get a rotten draw [Newport County/Barnet and Stevenage/Port Vale respectively].”
“No chance of TV coverage by the way, no chance of a big payday. What they need to do is seed the third round draw of the FA Cup. For goodness sake, it is not too difficult.”
Stelling then called for the 20 teams who advance from the second round to be kept apart, thus giving them a tie against either Premier League and Championship opposition and vastly increasing their chances of a ‘glamour’ draw.
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We can certainly see the point that the ex-Soccer Saturday host is making, although his proposal is sure to polarise opinion within English football followers.
While some will welcome his idea, others with a more conservative mindset will probably lament any calls for the long-standing open draw format of the FA Cup to be discontinued, with the competition having already seen traditions such as replays from the fifth round onwards being scrapped.
From a Liverpool perspective, there’d be a welcome novelty to coming up against a team from outside the top two divisions, with some clubs in the third round bound to have been praying either for a trip to Anfield or for the Reds to visit them.
Alas, we instead must face three meetings against Arsenal (potentially four if a replay is needed) inside six weeks, with the clubs’ two Premier League head-to-heads spaced comparatively close to one another this season.
Maybe Stelling’s suggestion of a seeded draw will be adopted in future campaigns, but for now Jurgen Klopp and LFC won’t experience the rarity of a non-league club taking them on in football’s oldest competition.
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