The Scottish League Cup by David Potter

Author:David Potter
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pitch Publishing
Published: 2022-06-15T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER EIGHT

RANGERS STOP THE ROT 1983–1985

CELTIC DID not hold on to their Scottish League Cup for long and the rest of the 1982/83 season was poor. Charlie Nicholas caused problems by wanting away and mysteriously did not play in the Scottish Cup semi-final when they needed him, the team blew up spectacularly in the League in April and manager Billy McNeill departed in the summer. Rangers were nowhere, Dundee United won the Scottish Premier League for the first and only time and 1983 was distinguished by Aberdeen winning the European Cup Winners’ Cup, beating Real Madrid in the final. They then won the Scottish Cup, although manager Alex Ferguson was upset because he felt they did not play well enough!

The Scottish League Cup was tinkered with again for season 1983/84. There was a first round of six games, then a second round (home and home like the first round) of 16 games, and the remaining 16 teams then went into a sectional format. Mercifully, only one team qualified from each, but the major disadvantage was that the six sectional games were played midweek between 31 August and 30 November – possibly too long a period interspersed with European games and international fixtures. Frankly, the format failed to excite the fans and it was only really when the tournament got to the semi-final stage that things got interesting.

The semi-finals and the final were now after the New Year, a welcome change. A major boost was the news that, for the first time ever, the Scottish League Cup Final would be televised live on TV. There was history here. The SFA and the Scottish League had traditionally resisted live television, feeling that it would deter people from going to watch games in person. This bigoted and short-sighted policy often had ridiculous results like the English FA Cup Final being blocked lest it prevent people going to junior games. The English FA Cup Final was, of course, shown in England, so viewers of Border TV who lived in the south of Scotland, or other parts of Scotland where mountains did not get in the way, could still see the game.

Nevertheless, since 1977 (on the insistence of a sponsor) the Scottish Cup Final had been televised live, without any huge effect on the attendance. Attendances had dropped since the halcyon days of the 1960s, but it would be facile to attribute this to television. And the benefit of these games being televised was that everyone could watch them. Now this privilege was extended to the Scottish League Cup, allowing anyone who wanted to see the Scottish League Cup Final as well. You cannot really claim that a tournament is a national one if the nation doesn’t get the chance to see the final. And the first televised final was a good game to start with!

The second-round games did not produce any great shocks, although Hearts were lucky to beat Cowdenbeath on penalties and Celtic were booed off the park after a dreadful 0-0 draw against Brechin City at Celtic Park.

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