Many will say it should have happened years ago, most will argue that it should never happen, but it seems now that it will.
Yes, the FA Cup is to be shaken up and changed, including losing it's traditional 3P.M Kick off as the FA look set to bow to pressure from sponsors and broadcaster's to switch the Kick off time to a 5.30P.M start from the 2013 season onwards.
The idea is that broadcasters believe it is a time when the Cup will get 'maximum exposure'. The Premier League now has 5.30 kick offs, however I think this will damage the competition rather than boost it.
The Cup Fnal day is a special day on the footballing calender, regardless if your side features in it. Every year families gather around their t.v's to watch the final, I remember my childhood growing up watching the Cup final around my grandad's house and him telling me stories of when he would watch it every year when he was younger.
Another plan is to seed teams so that big clubs cannot face each other earlier in the competition, again another sad move from the FA as they look to ruin the finest club competition in history.
We only need to look to next weekends 5th round ties and see Manchester United v Crawley as to why this cup is magical- a move such as seeding teams would put an end to this sense of magic.
We would lose the battles that we have seen in recent years that have added love back to the competition, look at Stevenage v Newcastle in Round Three this season, only in the FA Cup would you get a result like that.
It looks as though that the FA will pass these changes in the coming months and maybe just kill off any romance that us fans have for the greatest competition in club football, and all on the weekend of love. Happy valentines.
Do you agree? Let me know what you think about these possible changes, would they be good or bad for the FA Cup? And let me know your favourite FA Cup moment.
I'm not sure I agree, the idea of everyone gathering on a sunsetting may evening for a huge game sounds quite romantic, for the final at least. And as for the seeding, surely that could help the chances of the small teams that make the 3rd round pulling out a huge name, rather than being dissapointed with 'home v stockport cnty', they need the money from that big fixture at the end of the day, and if it throws out more 'man utd - crawleys', while the giants play out the big games in the later stages, as they always do.. i am all for it.
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