Following the decision to cancel the French League Cup from next season, Will Rook explains why he thinks that we shouldn't do the same.
Trophies are important
Don’t let anyone tell you that winning the EFL Cup isn’t a big deal anymore.
It has been hugely important for both Pep Guardiola and Jose Mourinho in recent seasons, while it surely help take a bit of pressure off Mauricio Pochettino too, if Tottenham hadn’t already been knocked out.
Manchester City’s quest for the quadruple only became a thing after winning the tournament last February and, though they didn’t manage all four, the EFL Cup still counted as the first leg in a historic domestic treble.
Jose Mourinho, meanwhile, was remarkably keen to show the world how many trophies he won during his first season in charge at Manchester United by instructing his players to hold up three fingers to the camera while celebrating their Europa League triumph. Never mind that one of them was the Community Shield.
Honours, no matter where they come from, are still important.
For all the talk of the tournament being an irrelevance or inconvenience, winning a major trophy is still worth shouting about.
We all love a cupset
The ‘magic of the FA Cup™’ is often trumpeted as a reason that the tournament should be sacrosanct.
Of course, that magic has much to do with more than a century of history, but it also owes a lot to the fact that people enjoy the unpredictability of seeing small teams play big teams.
Watching a Premier League side pitch up to Accrington, Morecambe or Macclesfield and struggle to deal with the conditions is always a hoot. It’s even better when there’s a shock.
The financial benefits can be huge for lower-league sides, as well.
So it seems strange that we would ever consider scrapping another potential avenue for such scenes.
With the majority of Premier League sides entering the EFL Cup in the second round, as opposed to the third round of the FA Cup, there is even more potential for underdogs to have their day.
And, since being founded in 1960, the League Cup has provided plenty of its own magic in the recent past, with four Football League clubs making the final since the turn of the century.
This season, we have already seen Colchester knock out Tottenham, while Rochdale pushed Manchester United all the way to penalties at Old Trafford.
Why deprive ourselves of those moments?
It makes Europe accessible
That unpredictability can, in turn, open the door to European competition for clubs that would have had little chance otherwise.
Yes, the EFL Cup has been won by a member of the Big Six in each of the last six seasons, but that does not tell the full story.
In five of the last eight years, the semi-finals have included at least one team from outside the Premier League.
Past winners include QPR (1967), Swindon (1969), Oxford (1986), Luton (1988), Middlesbrough (2004), Birmingham (2011) and Swansea (2013).
As a result of winning the competition, the last three in that list were all able to compete in the Europa League (or UEFA Cup, if you prefer) for the first time in their history.
This season, we are already guaranteed at least one team from League One and another from League Two side in the last eight, while two of Manchester United, Chelsea, Liverpool and Arsenal won’t be there.
With the top of the Premier League as predictable as ever, having a back door into Europe for everyone else is no bad thing.
More opportunities for young players
The benefit of clubs rotating their teams in the EFL Cup is that it allows them to develop their younger players by exposing them to first-team football.
This season has already seen impressive performances from Arsenal’s 18-year-old Gabriel Martinelli, who scored a brace against Nottingham Forest in the third round, while 16-year-old Harvey Elliot caught the eye for Liverpool against MK Dons.
Phil Foden is another who has seen more time on the pitch as a result of the competition.
The 19-year-old featured in all five of Manchester City’s EFL Cup matches prior to the final, starting four of them and scoring two goals.
Getting rid of the tournament would surely limit the first-team involvement of those rising stars. Instead we should welcome the opportunity to give them more game time.
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