The New Romance of The Cup

The father of the modern Olympics, Baron Pierre de Coubertin, said "The most important thing in the Olympic Games is not winning but taking part." Which I have always found somewhat contradictory when set against the Olympic motto - also coined by de Coubertin - "Citius, altius, fortius"   (swifter, higher, stronger), suggesting a quest to be the best.

It has been said that it is only losers who say that winning is less important than taking part and most people would agree that in competitive sport, winning is by definition the object of the exercise. Take the joy we have felt in Britain at the success of our athletes at both the Olympics and Paralympics in 2012 and 2016; it is a radical departure from our usual practice, honed over many decades, of celebrating glorious failure.

Pierre de Coubertin, father of the modern Olympics.

But success in sport has to be measurable objectively, which if you think is stating the obvious, let me explain one of the problems I have with certain sports. A football match is won by the team that scores the most goals, a tennis match by the player who wins the most sets, a golf tournament by the player who shoots the lowest scores - all measurable without ambiguity. I have always had a problem with sports where the outcome is decided by the opinion of one person, or a group. Take diving, or gymnastics. Sometimes, even to the untrained eye, one competitor will clearly be better than another, but with both these sports there are exercises or dives with varying degrees of difficulty, with different tariffs and which are scored by expert judges on the basis of their opinion - an informed opinion, but an opinion nonetheless. Generally, however it seems the system in these sports works fairly well, with little or no debate over the results - the same cannot always be said for others, with boxing the event that is frequently mired in controversy.

In the Rio games this summer, Irish boxer Michael Conlan accused AIBA - that's the organisation that oversees  amateur boxing -  of corruption after losing on points in the bantamweight quarter-finals to the Russian Vladimir Nikitin.  “They’re known for being cheats. Amateur boxing stinks from the core right to the top,” he said. It was by no means the first highly contentious decision in Olympic boxing history and doubtless will not be the last.

How the Guardian reported Conlan's defeat in Rio.

In most team sports there are awards for individuals based on their performance in matches, and these, the Man of The Match award, or the prize for the Most Valuable Player or Player of The Year are by their very nature almost entirely subjective. Is the Man of The Match the rugby player who scored the winning try, the cricketer who took the most wickets, or the goalkeeper who saved a penalty? Or, is the Man of The Match the unspectacular player who performs with quiet perfection but without making a game changing impact? You pay your money and take your choice, but it is usually a subjective choice.

Equally subjective are those team awards given for the best performance in a specific month, or in the case of knock-out competitions, a particular round of matches. For instance, the Football Association's 'Club of The Round' award, handed out to the club deemed most meritorious in each round of the FA Cup. Traditionally this award has gone to clubs who have achieved an outstanding - and usually unexpected - result; the good old act of giantkilling. But not this season. This season the award for Club of The Round goes, not to the team who, against all odds, beat a team from a league - or several leagues - above them, but to the club that knows its way round social media better than its rivals.

Hereford United's famed FA Cup triumph over Newcastle United. This is how sport should be enjoyed.

The more common sight at football matches these days. If it isn't on your phone, it doesn't count.

This came to my attention - and I suspect, of a good many other people -for the first time when Altrincham won the award following their 3-1 Fourth Qualifying Round win over Matlock Town, a result as about as unsurprising as say, Premier League West Ham United beating Championship side Barnsley. But there again, they did not win the award on the pitch, but rather, they won it off it for their social media work ahead of the game. This is because this season, the FA's Club of The Round award is judged on non-playing criteria. Here is what the FA's website has to say on the subject:

The Emirates FA Cup Club of the Round has been introduced this season to recognise qualifying-round clubs for their efforts in advertising their games to drive attendance and raise recognition and awareness of non-league football.

From the first round qualifying onwards, clubs are given a suite of ten bespoke marketing assets by The FA to be used across print and social media. The first round qualifying fixtures, played over the weekend of 2-4 September, saw 117 of 232 clubs utilise the assets offered to them to proactively market their respective fixtures.

Clubs are judged on a range of criteria including attendance, number of promotional assets used on social media or in print, best social media coverage and video content, before the winner is selected from a shortlist of entrants by an FA panel.

Now, being the supporter of a non-League club, I am all in favour of initiatives that raise the profile of the game below the English Football League, and in doing so, the clubs who best use the various social media platforms and other types of material to publicise their games are to be congratulated. But I am somewhat uncomfortable about making an award for clubs whose use of Twitter is deemed more important than their efforts on the pitch.

This is how the FA's website described Hanwell Town's performance that won them the prize, which includes "£500 paid social media support" - whatever that entails -: "The club... was the first on record at this level to proactively use the marketing creative on a roadside LED, advertising their Emirates FA Cup fixture against Enfield Town on the A40 for nine days between 4am and 2am. They also used a range of assets provided across their social media account and recorded an attendance of 212 for their fixture against their north London opponents – a 77% increase on their usual average league gate of 120."

Photo from the Football Association website.

This is the new romance of the FA Cup, where terms like, "proactively use the marketing creative, " and "a range of assets provided across their social media account," replace back-page tales of derring-do as a non-League club earns a replay against a Football League team and where a last minute winner that pulls off sensational giantkilling is judged subordinate to one-hundred and forty characters tapped onto a smartphone screen. This convoluted jibber-jabber, much loved by marketing men and business school graduates, speaks of a complete lack of feeling for the sport, but top class football has been becoming increasingly about the commercial aspects and less about the action for years now, why should we be surprised if this is not spreading to all levels of the game?

Enfield Town (yellow), on the attack at Hanwell Town. Photo from the Hanwell Town website.

Sadly, that increased attendance at Hanwell's game has not been matched at any of their home games since, suggesting that the larger gate was possibly more to do with the visit of relatively well supported opponents than it was to do with Twitter activity or motorists on the A40 suddenly developing a longing to see the local football team in action. The report on Hanwell Town's website suggests that the home support was " seriously outnumbered by their North London visitors." But don't tell the Football Association that.

Social media and advertising are important these days, but not more than the sport. After all, where he alive today, I doubt Baron Pierre de Coubertin would be saying, "The most important thing in the Olympic Games is not winning but Tweeting about it." At least, I hope not.