| Founded | 1979 |
|---|---|
| Region | England |
| Number of teams | 68 (2008–09) |
| Current champions | A.F.C. Telford United (2008-2009) |
| Most successful club | Bromsgrove Rovers, Doncaster Rovers, Northwich Victoria & Runcorn (2 wins each) |
The Conference League Cup (formerly known as the Setanta Shield for sponsorship reasons, and before that the Bob Lord Trophy) was an English football competition open to clubs playing in levels 5 or 6 of the English football league system (steps 1 and 2 of the National League System), which covers the three Football Conference divisions.
The Conference League Cup was formed for the inaugural season of the Football Conference, in 1979-80 and existed for twenty-two seasons before being axed at the end of the 2000-01 season. It was briefly reformed for the 2004-05 season, in the form of the Conference Challenge Cup, but following a poor response it was again agreed not to renew the competition for the next season. With the transfer of sponsorship of the Conference to Blue Square for the start of the 2007-08 season two seasons later, the re-introduction of the competition was announced, scheduled to commence that very year.[1] On 23 June 2009 the Conference League Cup's sponsor, Setanta's GB division went into administration and ceased broadcasting. Without a sponsor, the tournament was put on an indefinite hiatus from the 2009-10 season.
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The competition was a knockout tournament with pairings drawn at random - like the FA Cup there is a minimal form of seeding, in that members of the (higher-level) Conference National enter together at a later stage in the tournament, and the draw for each round takes place after the completion of the round before. Assuming the Conference is neither expanded nor diminished in future, there will thus be an annual entry of 68 teams into the tournament. The first three rounds are contested solely between teams from the Conference's North and South divisions, however, until only 8 teams total from the two Divisions remain, at which point the teams of the Conference National will be entered. Matches which produce no winner after 90 minutes continue into extra time and then progress to a penalty shoot-out akin to the style of the Football League Cup, rather than scheduling replays as in the FA Cup, however the 2008-9 final between Forest Green Rovers and AFC Telford United went straight to penalties. The semi-finals and final are contested at the ground of the club higher ranked in the league. The first round is scheduled for October, with the intention that teams are unlikely to find themselves contesting the Conference League Cup at the same time as they play in the FA Cup and to a lesser extent, the FA Trophy, thus reducing the workload of even the more successful teams.
As an added incentive to attract greater crowds and more interest and commitment, the Football Conference announced that it has arranged a deal with Setanta Sports, the competition's sponsor, to provide live television coverage of the latter stages of the competition, thus generating much-needed revenue as well as interest from non-Conference sources.
The predecessor to the Setanta Shield was the one-season Football Conference Challenge Cup. The competition was formed for the 2004-05 Conference season as a competition in the style of the Football League Cup, with a series of one-leg matches played in a knockout tournament fashion, with extra time and penalties deciding the result in the event of a tied scoreline at the end of full-time, rather than the replay style of the FA Cup and other FA tournaments.
Although the Challenge Cup was announced before the start of the season, the format of the tournament was not decided upon until over a month after the season's games had started. The cup gained the sponsorship of Gladwish Land Sales, becoming the "GLS Cup".
The Challenge Cup was announced as scrapped shortly before the official start of the 2005-06 season.
Nevertheless, though its first season was blighted with misfortune, the competition did otherwise run smoothly, with Woking beating Stalybridge Celtic 1-0 in the final.
The Conference league cup had previously run for the first 21 seasons of the Football Conference's existence. The tournament was always considered as tertiary in importance to the FA Trophy and FA Cup. Like its successors, it struggled for attendances from fans. However, it did provide many clubs with the opportunity to win silverware that would otherwise have been missing.
| Season | Winner | Runner-up |
|---|---|---|
| 1979–80 | Northwich Victoria | Altrincham |
| 1980–81 | Altrincham | Kettering Town |
| 1981–82 | Weymouth | Enfield |
| 1982–83 | Runcorn | Scarborough |
| 1983–84 | Scarborough | Barnet |
| 1984–85 | Runcorn | Maidstone United |
| 1985–86 | Stafford Rangers | Barnet |
| 1986–87 | Kettering Town | Hendon |
| 1987–88 | Horwich RMI | Weymouth |
| 1988–89 | Barnet | Hyde United |
| 1989–90 | Yeovil Town | Kidderminster Harriers |
| 1990–91 | Sutton United | Barrow |
| 1991–92 | Wycombe Wanderers | Runcorn |
| 1992–93 | Northwich Victoria | Wycombe Wanderers |
| 1993–94 | Macclesfield Town | Yeovil Town |
| 1994–95 | Bromsgrove Rovers | Kettering Town |
| 1995–96 | Bromsgrove Rovers | Macclesfield Town |
| 1996–97 | Kidderminster Harriers | Macclesfield Town |
| 1997–98 | Morecambe | Woking |
| 1998–99 | Doncaster Rovers | Farnborough Town |
| 1999–00 | Doncaster Rovers | Kingstonian |
| 2000–01 | Chester City | Kingstonian |
| 2001–02 | not held | |
| 2002–03 | ||
| 2003–04 | ||
| 2004–05 | Woking | Stalybridge Celtic |
| 2005–06 | not held | |
| 2006–07 | ||
| 2007–08 | Aldershot Town | Rushden & Diamonds |
| 2008–09 | AFC Telford United | Forest Green Rovers |
| 2009–10 | not held | |
| 2010–11 | ||
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