Setanta Sports Cup

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The Setanta Sports Cup is a club football competition featuring teams from both football associations on the island of Ireland. It was inaugurated in 2005 as a cross-border competition between clubs from the Eircom League from the Republic of Ireland and the Irish Premier League from Northern Ireland.

The cup is sponsored by Setanta Sports; the Irish sports television network. The competition was launched with Setanta providing support for prize money (€350,000) and sponsorship (€1.6 million over 4 years).

The competition features 4 teams from each league with the winners and runners up of the respective leagues, the winners of the respective major cup competitions, FAI Cup, and Irish Cup, and the winners of the respective secondary cup competitions, the eircom League Cup and Northern Ireland League Cup being added. If a club has qualified via a cup win and would also qualify by league table position, one of the spots would be awarded to the next highest club in the league table that has not qualified via a cup win. The competition is organised with two groups of four teams, semi-finals and a final.

Controversy is rife in the Setanta Cup with many Northern Irish fans claiming the Irish referees and media are against them and therefore the competition is unfair.^{[citation needed]} Despite this, Irish league clubs and in particular Linfield, have coped well despite the professional status of some Irish clubs.

1 History
2 Launch quotes
3 Results
- 3.1 Past winners
- 3.2 Performance By Club
4 External links

[edit] History

The Setanta Cup is the first cross-border competition since the 1980s. Previous competitions included the Dublin and Belfast Intercity Cup 1941/42-1948/49, the North-South Cup 1961/62-1962/63, the Blaxnit Cup 1967/68-1973/74, the Texaco Cup 1973/74-1974/75, and the Tyler Cup 1978-1980.

Previous tournaments ultimately failed due to a lack of interest and security concerns.

The inaugural Cup was played between March 15 and May 21, 2005 at the start of the League of Ireland season and the end of the Irish Premier League season.

[edit] 2005

Qualification for the 2005 cup was based on the national league and cup performances in the respective countries - the top two in each league and the winners of the FAI Cup and Irish Cup qualified. Teams were split into two groups with the winner of each qualifying for the final.

The 2005 competition saw Cork City, Longford and Shelbourne, represent the League of Ireland, and Glentoran, Linfield and Portadown represent the Irish League.

With a large financial prize and bragging rights at stake the 2005 Cup was a very competitive and combative affair. On the field there were many controversial moments with erratic and inconsistent match official decisions adding to the already charged atmosphere. But while tempers may have flared among players and club staff, the fans themselves showed that sets of supporters from both sides of the border weren't a security risk.

The eventual winners of the Cup, Linfield, started the campaign poorly losing 2:1 to Longford before going on to win their remaining group matches and beating pre-tournament favourites Shelbourne.

Group 1

Team	Played	Won	Lost	For	Against	Points
Linfield	4	3	1	9	6	9
Longford Town	4	2	2	4	4	6
Glentoran	4	1	3	6	9	3

Group 2

Team	Played	Won	Drew	Lost	For	Against	Points
Shelbourne	4	2	1	1	5	4	7
Portadown	4	1	2	1	5	4	5
Cork City	4	1	1	2	3	4	4

Final Shelbourne 0:2 Linfield (played at Tolka Park, Dublin}

[edit] 2006

The 2006 competition featured 4 teams from each league with the winners of the respective secondary cup competitions, the eircom League Cup and Northern Ireland League Cup being added. The competition was organised with two groups of four teams. The top two teams in each group entered a semi-final round with the winner progressing to the final.

For the 2006 competition the number of participating clubs was expanded from six to eight, four from each league.

The League of Ireland was represented by Cork City, Derry City, Shelbourne and Drogheda United with the Irish Premier League being represented by Linfield, Glentoran, Portadown and Dungannon Swifts

A total of 27 matches were played with the competition kicking off on Monday 20 February 2006 with the final having been played on Saturday 22 April 2006 at Tolka Park in Dublin.

Group 1

Team	Played	Won	Drew	Lost	For	Against	Points
Cork City	6	5	1	0	11	2	16
Drogheda United	6	3	1	2	7	5	10
Dungannon Swifts	6	1	1	4	4	8	4
Portadown	6	0	3	3	4	11	3

Group 2

Team	Played	Won	Drew	Lost	For	Against	Points
Linfield	6	2	4	0	12	4	10
Shelbourne	6	2	3	1	7	3	9
Derry City	6	1	4	1	5	4	7
Glentoran	6	1	1	4	5	18	4

Semi-finals:

Cork City 2-0 Shelbourne (Turners Cross, Cork)
Linfield 0-1 Drogheda United (Windsor Park, Belfast)

Final:

Drogheda United 1-0 Cork City (Tolka Park, Dublin)

[edit] 2007

The draw for the 2007 competition was made on 07 December 2006 with the original competing teams being the identical ones to the previous year's competition. On the 30 January 2007, however, Shelbourne FC announced that they were withdrawing from the competition for reasons relating to their financial troubles and the fact that they would be unlikely to field a team of players. Their place was given to the 2006 FAI Cup runners-up to Derry City FC, St Patrick's Athletic FC. While it is likely that the organisers transferred Derry, who finished second in the league, into Shelbourne's empty slot, first in the league, for the purpose of official qualification and then accorded St Pat's qualification by way of the FAI Cup, this would have logically entailed Derry moving into Group 2 to fill Shelbourne's place, while St. Patrick's should compete in Group 1 in the place of the moved Derry.^{[citation needed]} However, it is possible that for the purposes of the initial draw, teams were accorded lots on an alphabetical basis.^{[citation needed]} Thus, it would follow that St. Patrick's would have been assigned the same lot as Shelbourne and would have, as a result, been drawn in the same slot anyway.^{[citation needed]}

The first round of matches commenced on Monday 26 February 2007. The prize of £100,000 was on offer to the winner, with the runner-up to receive £55,000.

Group 1 score-card and table:
The home team is listed in the left hand column.

	Derr.	Drog.	Glen.	Linf.
Derry City	-	0-0	1-2	2-2
Drogheda United		-	2-0	0-1
Glentoran	0-1	0-1	-
Linfield	2-1	0-0	1-1	-

Team	Played	Won	Drew	Lost	For	Against	Points
Linfield FC	5	2	3	0	6	4	9
Drogheda United	5	2	2	1	3	1	8
Derry City FC	5	1	2	2	5	6	5
Glentoran FC	5	1	1	3	3	6	4

Group 2 score-card and table:

	Cork	Dung.	Port.	St. P.
Cork City	-		4-0	1-3
Dungannon Swifts	0-0	-	1-1	2-2
Portadown	0-7	2-2	-
St. Patrick's Athletic	1-0	5-0	3-0	-

Team	Played	Won	Drew	Lost	For	Against	Points
St Patrick's Athletic FC	5	4	1	0	14	3	13
Cork City FC	5	2	1	2	12	4	7
Dungannon Swifts	5	0	4	1	5	10	4
Portadown FC	5	0	2	3	3	17	2

Knock-out stage:

	Semi finals				Final

	23 April – Dublin (Richmond Park)
	St. Patrick's Athletic


					10 May – TBC





	30 April -

	Cork City

[edit] Launch quotes

"The Setanta Cup will promote all that's positive about our leagues and this will cascade through all levels of the game."
—David Chick, Irish Premier League Chairman

"The Setanta Cup not only revives the great tradition of north/south competitions but also provides a huge financial opportunity for clubs."
—Milo Corcoran, Football Association of Ireland President

"We're delighted to have unveiled the Setanta Cup trophy and are looking forward to the Setanta Cup becoming one of the great Irish sporting events."
—Niall Cogley, Chief Executive, Setanta Sports [1]