United women | WSL Cup QF draw - fixtures 24/25

StretfordEnd78 said:
Anyone think the attendance could be low?
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For the opening match against West Ham at Old Trafford?

In terms of marketing for the match, it's early days but I'm not optimistic. It's easier to get United watchers who haven't been to a women's game before to a match if they're feeling excited about United as a club in general. So we could do with the men to go on a good run now.

Last season had that awkward ending of us getting hammered by Chelsea at OT as well and it was a pretty poor game. It should have been our lap of honour with the FA Cup - it turned into a bit of an anticlimax.

We'll see. The fans of the women's team will be there - at least the ones who aren't away that day watching the men play at Palace etc.

In general at LSV for the season. I think the crowd won't be affected much by losing Mary Earps, Katie Zelem - but the team certainly needs some new heroes.

We've lost most of the glamour that our lionesses brought back from the Euros, we will need to get that buzz back - by playing well. I think the squad is capable of it. Let's see if our manager can rise to the occasion.
 
jojojo said:
For the opening match against West Ham at Old Trafford?

In terms of marketing for the match, it's early days but I'm not optimistic. It's easier to get United watchers who haven't been to a women's game before to a match if they're feeling excited about United as a club in general. So we could do with the men to go on a good run now.

Last season had that awkward ending of us getting hammered by Chelsea at OT as well and it was a pretty poor game. It should have been our lap of honour with the FA Cup - it turned into a bit of an anticlimax.

We'll see. The fans of the women's team will be there - at least the ones who aren't away that day watching the men play at Palace etc.

In general at LSV for the season. I think the crowd won't be affected much by losing Mary Earps, Katie Zelem - but the team certainly needs some new heroes.

We've lost most of the glamour that our lionesses brought back from the Euros, we will need to get that buzz back - by playing well. I think the squad is capable of it. Let's see if our manager can rise to the occasion.
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I am pleased with recruitment. Season tickets have sold well at LSV but we were poor at OT last year. Just got a feeling attendance could be 20k or so which is still good but lower than previously.
 
StretfordEnd78 said:
I am pleased with recruitment. Season tickets have sold well at LSV but we were poor at OT last year. Just got a feeling attendance could be 20k or so which is still good but lower than previously.
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You're right about us being poor at OT. Our two biggest league games last season were there and both of them were defeats. City and Chelsea - two very poor performances as well. The City one was in front of our biggest home crowd so far (43k) and against Chelsea it was about 28k.

I doubt we'll get 28k for this one unless the late marketing push is huge so I suspect you're right.
 
Now we know that City aren't joining our WSL League Cup group:
 
Nice that there's a chance of knockouts for a change! Subject to other teams cheating like last year of course...
 
Every person who has taken a day off work, booked hotels and travel shall instantly unite and demand that Chelsea pays all of these costs INCLUDING INTEREST. Chelsea has already been given the group stage of the league cup off and a place for free in the playoffs. And now they want other fictures moved anyway despite them having 2 squads which was the reason they lost 4.1£ million last season. I am tired of this adapting to Chelsea all the time!
 
JFC, what a kick in the pants. Glad I didn't go for this away game but man I feel for those that did.
 
This whole mess should raise serious questions about the league cup



in the Men's game we are one of the only countries with 2 domestic cups, most clubs probably want rid of it but it is difficult to kill off a competition that is so ingrained into the historic calendar



The Women's game should learn from that and cancel the league cup now or bare minimum make it straight knock out, no need for a convoluted group stage (especially after last year's farce)
 
Rood said:
This whole mess should raise serious questions about the league cup



in the Men's game we are one of the only countries with 2 domestic cups, most clubs probably want rid of it but it is difficult to kill off a competition that is so ingrained into the historic calendar



The Women's game should learn from that and cancel the league cup now or bare minimum make it straight knock out, no need for a convoluted group stage (especially after last year's farce)
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This could just as easily have happened to the City or the Arsenal match - one of them was going to play on Tuesday night and all of them were scheduled to play (London v the North West!) matches on Sunday. At its heart it's about the same kind of amateur mentality that last season postponed WSL matches at short notice to make room for WFA Cup replays.

Of course, it's about the whole relationship with TV and with the fans as well. Of course, Sky wanted United v Chelsea and they had no Saturday slot for it. Maybe it'll remind WSL to chase that 3pm Saturday exemption from the "no football on TV" ban.

There's a version of it that you sometimes see in Spanish football - late schedule changes usually to accommodate TV. The fans are so used to it they don't even comment on it. That said, there's no real tradition of "away fans" in La Liga, certainly in the travelling fan sense. That's something you only really get in the Copa and for European matches.

It's part and parcel of selling your soul to the TV companies. But for women's pro football it's all happening at the same time. Sky want crowds and atmosphere at matches but that takes years to build and it's fragile.

It's already hampered by international football that continually breaks the rhythm of club football. It's damaged every time they schedule matches so it's impossible to watch the men and the women on the same weekend - sometimes not even on TV.

Doubtless they'll tell us they've learned from it. I just hope they don't learn to give up on the idea that clubs have to build proper fan bases not just merchandise for waving at Cup finals.
 
The R4 draw in full:
London Bees vs Rugby Borough
Leicester City vs Stoke City
West Ham vs Liverpool
Arsenal vs Bristol City
Chelsea vs Charlton Athletic
Exeter City vs Sunderland
Cheltenham Town vs Wolves
Brighton vs Durham
Newcastle United vs Nottingham Forest/Burnley
Kidderminster/Blackburn vs Portsmouth
Man City vs Ipswich Town/AFC Bournemouth
Aston Villa vs Oxford United/Bristol Rovers
Everton vs Tottenham
Man Utd vs West Brom
Crystal Palace vs Sheffield United
Fulham vs London City Lionesses
 
The clash of the Rabjohn sisters. Hopefully Evie will be fit for this. A debut against her former club for Lucy Newell would be nice too!
 
The Cup matches are on the weekend of 11/12 January.

The first match back after the Christmas break.
 
The WSL Cup isn't the Continental Cup anymore it's now the Subway Cup.

No seeding in today's draw. The 8 teams are:

United
City
Chelsea
Arsenal
Durham
Brighton
West Ham
Spurs

12:30 WSL youtube
 
Chelsea v Durham :o
Spurs v West Ham
United v City :lol:
Brighton v Arsenal

Inevitable
 
They're also drawing the semifinals now.

Brighton/Arsenal v United/City
Chelsea/Durham v Spurs/West Ham

So according to my calculations the final will be:
United v Durham
 
jojojo said:
They're also drawing the semifinals now.

Brighton/Arsenal v United/City
Chelsea/Durham v Spurs/West Ham

So according to my calculations the final will be:
United v Durham
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You’ve done your maths well.
 
What a beautiful christmas present for the travelling fans.

 
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top1whoisman said:
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So that's City at the Etihad (WSL) on Sun 19th
Then City at LSV (WSLCup QF) on Wed 22nd

That's going to be an interesting week.

I've also just noticed that it looks like we're in the Sunday 6:45pm slot for 3 consecutive weeks. It's almost as if someone's running an experiment.
 
top1whoisman said:
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So that's City at the Etihad (WSL) on the 19th
Then City at LSV (WSLCup QF) on the 22nd

That's going to be an interesting week.

I've also just noticed that we're in the Sunday 6:45pm slot for 3 consecutive weeks. It's almost as if someone's running an experiment.
 
6.45pm Sunday kick-offs? It's like the powers have zero interest in promoting the women's game given the sheer number.of children who would normally attend.

There has to be a concerted effort to encourage crowds if the game is to grow. The attendance for the storm-affected Newcastle cup game was something like 1750, whereas the Palace v Spurs game attracted only 175 supporters. I think it was @jojojo who referred to the "amateur mentality" of the organisers. How true.

Broadcasting rights brings in some money. I get that. But there are only 22 WSL games per season, so there really is no excuse for not playing all cup games at a reasonable time on a Saturday or Sunday.
 
Demon Barber said:
6.45pm Sunday kick-offs? It's like the powers have zero interest in promoting the women's game given the sheer number.of children who would normally attend.

There has to be a concerted effort to encourage crowds if the game is to grow. The attendance for the storm-affected Newcastle cup game was something like 1750, whereas the Palace v Spurs game attracted only 175 supporters. I think it was @jojojo who referred to the "amateur mentality" of the organisers. How true.

Broadcasting rights brings in some money. I get that. But there are only 22 WSL games per season, so there really is no excuse for not playing all cup games at a reasonable time on a Saturday or Sunday.
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I do understand that they want to avoid clashing with PL games. That’s the single reason this slot exists. For match-going fans it’s a nightmare though.
 
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