Scottish League Cup

Scottish League Cup
Scottish League Cup 2007-08

Founded
1947
Nation
Scotland
Number of teams
42
Holders (2006-07)
Hibernian

The Scottish Football League Cup is a football competition open to all Scottish Football League and Scottish Premier League clubs. At present it is also known as the CIS Insurance Cup owing to the sponsorship deal in place with CIS Co-operative Insurance. In the past it has been sponsored by Coca-Cola, Skol lager, and Bell's whisky. The competition, like the Scottish Cup, is currently a straight knockout format.

Hibernian are the current holders after defeating Kilmarnock 5-1 at Hampden Park on March 18 2007. They were eliminated from the 2007/2008 tournament on September 26 2007, losing 4-2 to Motherwell.

Currently, the domestic television and radio rights are held by BBC Scotland.

Current format

The competition is open only to the 42 senior clubs who compete in the Scottish Premier League or Scottish Football League.

There are no replays, so all matches ending in a draw after 90 minutes are decided by extra time and, if necessary, penalty kicks.

The four teams who, based on results of the previous season, have qualified for UEFA competitions are given a bye until the 3rd round of competition while the ten teams who finished highest in the SPL/SFL without qualifying for Europe receive a bye into the 2nd round.

The remaining 28 teams begin play from the 1st round. They are drawn into random pairings with the games played at the stadium of the first team drawn. The 14 teams advancing from the first round are joined by the 10 teams who received byes into the 2nd round. Of the 24 teams competing in the 2nd round, the 12 teams who finished highest in the league during the previous season are seeded against the second group of 12. The teams who advance from the 2nd round are joined by the final four teams in the 3rd round, again, with seeding in place.

The remaining rounds of competition are unseeded.

The semi-final matches are played on a neutral ground, traditionally the home ground of a third club located close to the two competing clubs, however, recent semi-finals have all been played at Hampden Park in Glasgow.

The final game is also traditionally played at Hampden Park in Glasgow, though due to renovations some finals in the past have been played at other venues such as Celtic Park.[1]

History

The cup has its origins in a regional cup competition called the Southern League Cup which was introduced in 1940 when wartime restrictions led to a suspension of the Scottish FA Cup. This tournament was largely regional and did not involve all of the teams who comprised the Scottish Football League prior to the outbreak of war.

The first official Scottish Football League Cup was contested during the 1946-47 season when Rangers defeated Aberdeen in the final. However, Aberdeen still includes their victory in the 1945-46 Southern League Cup tournament among their honours.

The competition was very popular with supporters during the first few decades of its existence. The tournament consisted of 8 or 9 groups consisting of 4 or 5 teams. The groups were seeded into 2 sets with the top 16 teams in Division 1 making up the first four Groups. This guaranteed that 4 'top' teams would play 4 'lesser' teams in the quarter-finals. However, by the early 1980s, its long-winded format, which involved group rounds played early on in the season leading to two-legged knockout rounds similar to the modern UEFA Champions League, attracted much criticism.

In the mid-1980s the tournament was revamped to a shorter, single elimination knockout style with a final played prior to Christmas, which provided the excitement of a cup final early in the season.

During the 1999-2000 season, the semi-finals and final were moved to the springtime in order to avoid the congestion of fixtures caused by the early rounds of the UEFA club competitions and Scotland’s representatives in Europe were given automatic byes until the third round of competition.

Trophy

Since the competition's inception, the winning team has always been awarded the famous three-handled trophy known simply as the Scottish Football League Cup. However, during the 1980s when Skol lager sponsored the competition, a second trophy known simply as the "Skol Cup" was awarded concurrent to the first trophy. During the 1987-88 season when Rangers won their third Skol Cup, they were given permanent possession of this trophy and a new "Skol Cup" with a slightly different design was introduced the following season.

European qualification

In previous seasons, the winners of the Scottish League Cup were granted a place in the UEFA Cup although this privilege was rarely invoked as the winning teams usually qualified for Europe by some other means such as winning the League Championship or Scottish Cup. One recent example was Raith Rovers who represented Scotland in the UEFA cup in 1995 after winning the League Cup the previous season as a 1st Division team. In recent seasons this privilege has been revoked.

Media coverage

Scottish League Cup matches are currently shown live by BBC Scotland on their Sportscene show and they are also shown live in Ireland by Setanta Ireland or Setanta Sports 1. Both Setanta Ireland and BBC Scotland show the Final live.