EXPLAINED: Changes to the FA Cup for 2024/25 including replays scrapped!

Gail Davis details the FA Cup's plans to scrap replays from the first round proper, with fixtures now set to be played exclusively on weekends.

The FA and the Premier League revealed they have reached a new agreement starting from next season for a minimum of six years to "strengthen" the competition with "new and exclusive calendar windows".

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[Syanarah]

The Premier League are trying to say that they are overworked? EFL teams in League One and Two have to play in the EFL Trophy, FA Cup and League cup as well as 46 games in the league per season. All this deal does is make sure the money distributed in the pyramid stays towards the top. If this is more about the workload than money, maybe the Premier League teams will have no problem donating all TV and prize money to EFL and non-league teams, especially since they are dragging their feet over the new EFL deal.

[portcullis]

So, to save you watching the video, those 2024/25 FA Cup changes in brief:

1. No replays.

2. The competition will start with the quarter finals, with just the top 8 clubs at the end of this seasons' Premier League. So, no need for rounds 1 to 5 and all those fixture- clogging one sided matches. This will save a lot of travelling for fans of clubs who have no chance of winning the FA Cup and it saves the players from the top 8 teams having to play too many matches.

3. The 8 clubs involved will all use their reserve teams. (No real change there then).

4. Proposal for the 2025/26 competition is scrap all the early rounds and just have the final, contested between the two clubs with the biggest bank balance (which is what usually happens anyway).
Alternatively, don't even bother with the final. Just award the trophy to the richest club at the start of the 2025/26 season.

Hope that is clear enough.

[catsquirrel]

Anyone in favour of this isn't a football fan.

[Bricks_Tricks_Mix]

who else agrees that this is just making a bigger gap between lower clubs and European powerhouses? next seasons gonna have so much ucl uel and uecl matches nobody gonna care about fa cup and efl cup anymore :(

[MeganeMondeoMX]

FA Cup used to be a prestigious competition, now it just seems like a nuisance to big clubs.

Scrap the League Cup!

[coronatedcobbler]

£2, 000, 000, 000 spent, 115 charges of breaching FFP and 1 UCL. That's absolutely criminal, in more ways than one.

[coronatedcobbler]

🎵All about that bass, bout that bass: no treble. 🎵

[mattquinn]

With no more replays you have to say some of the magic of the cup dies. How many smaller clubs will miss out on trips to big grounds and the revenue that brings them, and how many fans will miss out on potential games?

[mattquinn]

If 'fourth, fifth and quarter final weekends will not clash with Premier League games' surely this means they're making more space in the calendar for the FA cup, yet there's no time to have replays? If clubs in European competition can't find time in their schedules to keep having replays that's their problem, but it's the EFL clubs who will suffer instead!

[savilleian]

Good old sky make it all about the premier league and forget about the rest

[PoppieJones]

Why have round 1 and round 2 replays been scrapped, richer clubs get richer poorer clubs gets poorer, the FA and Ptemier League were so gutless not to let the Football League have a say

[nogingerfool]

explanation 4 or 5 teams in the premiership want more money because they are greedy bastards- the end.

[alanfox]

Now a day's
The D.F.B Pokal
Is much better to whach
The D.F.B. has gotten right what The F.A. can't.

Lowe league club always gets a home, draw the extra time & pens on the night if need no need for
any replays & it still has its magic.

[podgeftbl]

coronatedcobbler is desperate for likes holy moly

[nedeast]

I once heard a player, at a top Prem club, saying he would rather play 3 games a week, than not play and spend the week training

[YoiAmGucci]

And just like that, The FA Cup is made worse. FA Cup replays can sustain a club for years. I have never been happy for Arsenal to concede a goal until Jonathan Tehoue scored for Leyton Orient to make it 1-1 in what I think was the 5th round, maybe it was the 4th. Orient celebrated like it was the cup final itself. As my second team I was happy for them as it meant a trip to the Emirates. It was a huge pay day and earned them I think well over 500k and a trip to Vegas I believe courtesy of the owner Hearn.

I like that all FA Cup games will be played at the weekend and Prem league matches should never happen on FA Cup Final weekend. That should be after the season finishes.

The FA Cup is being made worse. Bring replays back, they can be midweek. Save the Replay.

[Speedinnit]

Whos glad away goal rule was scrapped from ucl 👇

[MrBluebirds]

Such a shame to see replays go. Was nice to see close ties get to played again and small clubs drawing at home to bigger clubs and getting and away fixture.

[TonyTriesToCode]

this is good. Funding gets increased and no more shitty replays, get it over and done in pens. Who wants to watch a replay in a cup knockout competition There is no real downside to this

[alexandermoonen]

Look at Chris Wilders’s comments about fa’s decision making to.He’s right about the big boys exc.Look, I understand, it’s business, it’s money talks, revenue.But all the teams in the first round qualifier and not get a reply, which I think it’s a shame, ridiculous to make a decision like this, in the past we have this debate and discussed about the players welfare, the schedule is getting relentless in the amount of games we are playing on Saturday and then Tuesday.We have spoken a lot, we have said to FIFA and UEFA to change, they have of course denied and not listened to, they just keep their money into their pockets.I love football, I love watching English matches on the tele and of course going to a stadium because of the tradition and history, back in the 50, 60, 70, 80, 90s was for me a tradition, fa cup matches were really special.if you look at the old Wembley, it’s a special day on the fa cup final and now semi-finals in Wembley, which shouldn’t be in this way, it should be in the current stadium.The old days and tradition of the fa cup is gone, so I don’t think it’s going to be back where it was.Shame on Fa and FIFA and UEFA.