Another European compilation thread.

Last night saw Valencia lift the Copa del Rey and the noble exit of Carquefou, the part-timers from the regionalised French Fifth Division who had disposed of Nancy and OM (among others) before running out of gas against PSG in the quarter-finals. But France being France, there are still two Ligue 2 teams in the semi-finals. The late stages in most of the rest of Europe feature usual suspects with Turkey, Russia, and of course "England", being notable exceptions.

Here's a rundown of where things stand in a number of countries:

France: Semi-finalists: PSG, Lyon, Amiens (D2), Sedan (D2)

Italy: currently half way through the two-leg semi-finals in a competition that generates strikingly little interest.
First leg results:

Roma 1 Catania 0; Inter 0 Lazio 0

The Coppa Italia features a tennis-like "bracket" draw, and will produce a Roma-Inter final for the fourth straight year if those clubs win their semis. At least this year's will be a single match.

Germany:
Borussia Dortmud - Bayern Munchen, the final is this weekend in Berlin

Spain:
Valencia 3 Getafe 1 in last night's final.

Portugal:
Porto - Sporting in the final.
Steveeeeeee has a report of Sporting's rock'em sock'em defeat of Benfica in last night's semi-final in the "5-3" thread

Netherlands:
Feyenoord - Roda in the final;
Ajax went out in the round of 16 and PSV earlier than that.

Belgium:
Anderlecht - Ghent in the final.
Ghent put out Standard and Anderlecht eliminated Germinal Beerschot in the two-legged semis that finished last night.

Greece:
Olympiakos - Aris Salonika in the final.

Turkey:
Kayserispor - Gencerbirligi in the final.
Gencerbirligi (from Ankara) put out Galatasaray in the two- legged semis that ended this week; Fenerbahce (to Galatasaray) and Besiktas went out in the round of 16.

Russia:
Amkar Perm - CSKA Moscow in the final.
Amkar is not Russian for "bubble"; Perm is in easternmost European Russia, just west of the Urals. CSKA put out the marvellously named "Tom Tomsk" in the semis.

QUOTE:
The Coppa Italia features a tennis-like "bracket" draw, and will produce a Roma-Inter final for the fourth straight year if those clubs win their semis.

That's pretty remarkable. Has that ever happened before in any country?

I could give you a Scilly answer, but I'll spare you that.

Arf.

I would imagine that you would need to get almost to that level of "two club dominance" before you would find another example, but the structure of the Coppa Italia makes it statistically more likely to happen than elsewhere.

Under the current format, only clubs from Serie A and Serie B are eligible to start with, and the top eight clubs from Serie A have direct entry to the round of 16 (and are kept apart in the "bracket"), with all rounds from that point until the final being contested over two legs (thus further reducing the likliehood of "shocks").

That format seems totally contrary to the point and to the spirit of cup competitions.

Do any of the non-British countries actually enjoy cup competitions?

The German Cup is usually quite fun, especially because the club from the lower division gets home advantage.

Italy is notoriously the least "cup-friendly" nation among major UEFA countries, but from my experience I would say that only France begins to approach the British sense of interest in and dedication to the Cup. Germany would probably be a bit ahead of Spain in any such table, with the rest trailing. Italy didn't even have a Cup for most of the pre-WWII period, and didn't restart the competition until the late 50s.

A Roma-Lazio final would be something of a laugh mind you.

Wales

Final: Bangor City v. Llanelli

The FAI cup 2nd round is this weekend, and is the last round with just junior clubs in it. The ten winners will go through with the 22 league sides for the third round in August. The league has moved to summer football, but junior leagues haven't, so the cup tries to facilitate both.

Oh, and we enjoy our cup competition here.

Quarter finals in SA this weekend:

Black Leopards vs AmaZulu
Free State Stars vs Santos
FC Cape Town vs Mamelodi Sundowns
Black Aces vs Nathi Lions

FC Cape Town, Black Aces and Nathi Lions are first division sides.

Free State Stars vs Santos is the pick here: the 8th in the league against 3rd.

I'd laugh like a drain if little FC Cape Town manages to beat Sundowns, who are SA's version of Chelsea, in a mega-rich owner appoints coach with huge reputation and assembles very expensive team kind of way. Amusingly, after bossing the Premier League for a couple of years, Sundowns are 9th in the table.

Fot those of you interested... here's a link to the http://www.usopencup.com/US Open Cup web site.

The qualifying rounds which only feature Amateur Clubs (like mine) starts in the Fall of the preceding year. The US Federation is divided up into 4 Regions. Each State within each region, if participating (i.e. in 15 years we have never had an Amateur team from Maine or Vermont enter the competition) will hold its own knock-out tournament. The two finalists in the Region will then enter the Tournament proper and face teams from the lower rung of the USL - semi-pro or 'college amateur'. After that round, 'A' League teams enter and after that the next round features MLS teams. Although 4 MLS teams face qualifying ties to even out their own entrants. It's all a tad complicated.

However, it is one of the the oldest soccer tournaments in the world. It was first held in 1914.

I'm voting for a Roma-Lazio final too. That would be kind of fun.

Though it would be typical of the FIGC to move the final to Milan . . .

Inter's lack of interest in the competition is striking. There were barely 10,000 people there last night, and almost half of them were Laziali.

And to think we have to wait three weeks for the second leg. It's almost as if they designed the competiton with the goal of killing interest.

ursus arctos wrote:

QUOTE:


Russia:

CSKA put out the marvellously named "Tom Tomsk" in the semis.

I have seen Tom Tomsk away at Locomotiv, they are probably "my Russian side" as their name is close to my real surname and, er, I have the badge.