No FA cup replays? It’s time for an Independent Football Regulator says Mickey Ambrose

A football stadium — Image ©pexels/scgough

The Football Association has put the boot into their own competition, the famous FA Cup, for the second time by scrapping FA Cup replays. This has shocked the football family to its core, matching the controversy last year after they decided to allow the Premier League to consider selling FA Cup TV rights.

Football fans and English Football League clubs were shaken by this news. Even Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and Labour Leader Sir Keir Starmer couldn’t believet and for once they both agreed on something.

The campaign group The People’s FA wrote to HRH Prince William, Aston Villa fan and President of the FA, five months ago, about FA reforms. I even called for him to quit in an interview I gave for the Sun newspaper in November last year.

The People’s FA’s other dream, and my own, is to see the FA, the oldest sporting governing body in the world to be reformed. It’s something we have been campaigning for, for years. Even Prince William called for FA reform in 2016 but the FA, 160 years old and counting, is hard of hearing. They didn’t listen to him then and never will.

English Football League clubs are furious with this decision to scrap replays as it seems they were not consulted and some clubs are threat ening to boycott the FA Cup competition altogether.

Fans up and down the country are also unhappy as it’s precious income and their clubs’ financial livelihoods that is at stake. The smaller clubs, the so-called minnows from lower divisions, have a rare opportunity to boost income when they meet the bigger clubs in the later rounds of the Cup.

This is the magic of the FA Cup, which we all saw in the extraordinary Manchester United v Coventry clash on 21 AprilI. I knew it while growing up in Poplar watching World of Sport with Dickie Davies, Match of The Day with Jimmy Hill, John Motson (Motty with the sheepskin coat) and the Big Match with Brian Moore.

This latest agreement between the Premier League and the FA is just a further example of how the English Football League (EFL) and its clubs are being marginalised in favour of others further up the pyramid.

The EFL has called on both the Premier League and the FA, as the governing body, to reevaluate their approach to their footballing partnership with the EFL and engage more collaboratively on issues directly affecting their clubs. This is something the FA didn’t do. It was all done behind closed doors. The Premier League is not interested in the lower clubs and they are certainly against the introduction of an Independent Football Regulator. But we need an independent regulator to stop these behind closed doors deals. Now Newham Voices readers can be assured that plans are afoot to install a shadow Independent Football Regulator as soon as possible.

Question marks still remain, however, regarding the FA’s and Premier League’s conduct over this decision with no consultation first with clubs or the FA Council whose leader is Debbie Hewitt, Chair of the FA.

The FA is a weak governing body and allows the Premier League to run roughshod over them, something I have repeated many times in television interviews with the major broadcasters. This is why The People’s FA, of which I am Co Chair, is calling for reform it.

Finally, West Ham United. It has not been a good spell for David Moyes and the team of late. They gave everything in the second leg of the UEFA Europa League against the new German Bundesliga League Champions Bayer Leverkusen, resulting in a 1- 1 draw. Then came the 5-2 defeat at Crystal Palace. There is much to do in order to finish the season in style. They will need a turnaround but big tests await against Liverpool and Chelsea. Let’s see what they can do.

A photo of Mickey Ambrose — Mickey Ambrose

Mickey Ambrose is a former Chelsea and Charlton player who lives in Stratford.

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