FA CUP ~ Watch Live Football Article

The FA Cup is better known as, the football association challenge cup. It is a knockout cup competition in English football. Which is the oldest football competition in the world, beginning in 1871-72. The FA Cup also refers to the English men tournament. Chelsea currently holds the FA Cup and successfully beat Manchester United on May 19th. Overtime is were they scored guaranteeing themselves as the winners.The FA Cup involves clubs in the English Football League System. Six Welsh clubs that are currently playing in the FA Club are: Wrexham, Cardiff City, Newport County, Swansea City, Colwyn Bay and Merthyr Tydfil. All football league clubs and premier leagues may enter.Non-league clubs may also enter if they participated in the earlier season's of the FA Trophy or the FA Cup.They all must have a suitable stadium to play in. The competition begins in August.There are then 4 Qualifying Rounds and 6 rounds of the competition proper. The next to be played are Semi-Finals and then followed by the Final.The finals are played in May.Winning the entire competition of English football is a great honor. Only 8 teams who played outside the top level have done so since the start of the FA Cup.Matches in the FA Cup are held at the home ground of one of the two teams. Villa Park is the most used stadium, having been used for 54 semi-finals. At the end of the finals, the winning team is presented with a trophy, which they keep until the following year. On July 20th an idea was proposed by C.W. Alock. During the seasons of 1888 and 1889 qualifying rounds were brought in. It included clubs participating on regional basis and would continue til there was a single left, Which would be for the 4th Qualifying Round.In 1872 Wanderes became the first winners of the FA Cup. fifteen clubs had entered and only twelve played, there were thirteen games in total. Wanders, Blackburn Rovers, and Tottenham Hotspur have all won the FA Cups consecutively more than one time.Six clubs have won the competition as part of the league and cup double, they are: Manchester United, Preston North End, Aston Villa, Arsenal, Liverpool, and Hotspur FC. Kettering have scored the most goals in FA Cup history. Although the FA Cup is the oldest football competition in the world, its trophy is not, that title is claimed by the Scottish Cup. The present trophy is the fourth one, with the first, the "little tin idol", used from 1871-72 was stolen. It was never seen again and thought to have been melted down. A new bigger trophy was bought by the FA in 1911. It still exists, but to fragile to use, so an exact replica has been in use now since 1992. Qualifying rounds were introduced in 1888-89 season. During the same year Warwick County was the first non-league side to beat a first division club. In 1914 George V was the first monarch to FA Cup final between Burnley and Liverpool. The oldest FA Cup finalist was Walter "Billy" Hampson. He played for Newcastle United and was 41 years old. In the 1950's, Newcastle United held the FA Cup trophy on three occasions within a five year period.