Who else regrets the binning of the ECWC?

EnglishRanger

EnglishRanger

Well-Known Member
It's probably not practical to have it the way football is now but I always liked the competition and think it's a shame it ended. Obviously Rangers fans like it because of 1972 but leaving any bias aside there were some great matches and finals. One of the best finals I remember was Barcelona beating Fortuna Dusseldorf 4-3 aet in 1979.
 
Should be brought back as the way the European tournaments wer two legged affairs. Champion league is disgusting as it is the now.
 
It's ironic that they got rid of it, with the teams that would have entered it going in to the expanded UEFA Cup/Europa League, only to create a third tournament several years later.
Did they give the old ECWC trophy to any particular team to keep when they retired it or does the old trophy have any chance of resurfacing as the price for the Europa Conference winners?
 
BobbyShearer said:
I’m surprised that UEFA didn’t see a bit of a gap in the market for the Conference(hate that name) League.

Because a market for August-March European straight knockout football is most definitely there.
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I agree would be good cash is always king so there's always hope
 
The ECWC was only scrapped because winning a league and cup double became more commonplace by the 90s. CL spot takes precedence and invariably it meant runners-up would take the CWC place. The expansion of CL killed it.

It's a shame that the CWC was done away with, especially now that a 3rd competition has returned to the table. Could have been a place for a re-branding of sorts way back instead of a bloated UEFA Cup/ EL for 20-years.
 
skf said:
It's ironic that they got rid of it, with the teams that would have entered it going in to the expanded UEFA Cup/Europa League, only to create a third tournament several years later.
Did they give the old ECWC trophy to any particular team to keep when they retired it or does the old trophy have any chance of resurfacing as the price for the Europa Conference winners?
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Lazio were the final winners but would have only been permitted to create a 4/5ths replica of the original trophy.

Main one would still be with UEFA I'd reckon.

Think a new trophy is being created for the conference league.
 
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superallythe2nd said:
Lazio were the final winners but would have only been permitted to create a 4/5ths replica of the original trophy.

Main one would still be with UEFA I'd reckon.

Think a new trophy is being created for the conference league.
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Trophy is with UEFA, they loan it out for exhibits and suchlike.
 
I think it’d be much more difficult now to figure out who gets entry? From my memory you could only be entered into one European competition so what if the winner and runner up of the national cup have both qualified for CL or Europa?

Assuming similar maybe happened in the past but can’t recall the answer.
 
skf said:
It's ironic that they got rid of it, with the teams that would have entered it going in to the expanded UEFA Cup/Europa League, only to create a third tournament several years later.
Did they give the old ECWC trophy to any particular team to keep when they retired it or does the old trophy have any chance of resurfacing as the price for the Europa Conference winners?
Click to expand...
They’ve commissioned a new trophy but it should have been used . Bizarre that the europa and conference have a new trophy and not the CL- even though the competition bears no resemblance whatsoever to the old European cup .
 
Eventually, when there is a UEFA Super League, because it will happen within the decade. Then a 2 league midweek KO will be on the cards.
 
I do mate. I'm a grumpy old man about it tbh. Europe was simple, comp for the champion, comp for the second placed and a comp for the cup winners. Beautiful. Now? The so called champions league is filled with teams who haven't won a championship in years. It is a disgrace that we need to qualify when English also rans waltz into the group stages.
 
GR6Ger said:
The bigger clubs are barely interested in the Europa League. There would be next to no interest in a CWC.
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This is true - in the end it was generally regarded as a bit of a joke…. Which is unfortunate given the importance that national cups still have in a few countries.
 
I always had the feeling that taking it away killed national cup comps as smaller teams were up for it as a way into Europe.
 
A competition between European clubs who had to win something to qualify. Didnt get anything like the credit it deserved. More interesting than the current Europa league or this new competition they've created.
 
Gerrard the Great said:
A great tournament - if you won your main cup tournament you got entered. Anyone could win it and you were there coz you had won something. It would be far better than the Europa Conference League
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Or were runners up and the other side had qualified for the European Cup.

As we did when we won it in 72.
 
BobbyShearer said:
I’m surprised that UEFA didn’t see a bit of a gap in the market for the Conference(hate that name) League.

Because a market for August-March European straight knockout football is most definitely there.
Click to expand...
They tried an InterToto league to get into the ECWC - a mini qualifying league (if I'm right)

Partick entered one year, failed to qualify, and made a loss because of the cost of playing the away games. No one wanted to watch it because of a lack of glamorous names
 
Money Money Money. Totally ruined a game that should be so simple. I'm sure the younger generation will disagree but I miss the European cup,the CWC and the UEFA Cup. I also miss Spangles and Aztec Bars. Happier days.
 
I got the book about the cup winners cup "frozen in time", i recommend it a blast from the past with a quirky history.
 
Conference League trophy is garbage

i
 
I do.

I think UEFA really damaged European competition in the 90's.

The old European Cup was much better, IMO than the Champions League, which is just a cartel of the richest clubs.
 
I'd love to see it back, for me, it was quite the tournament, 32 teams battling it out.

I think football is cyclical, and we may see it back, I hope so.
 
Sunnyvale_Loyal said:
I do.

I think UEFA really damaged European competition in the 90's.

The old European Cup was much better, IMO than the Champions League, which is just a cartel of the richest clubs.
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I honestly don't see the problem with letting the massive money generating teams have their own league, the Super League will happen - just a matter of allowing UEFA controlling it really.

I see it a bit like the format of the Nation's League eventually, a midweek league schedule for the top 30 countries all ranked into levels with promotion and relegation. UEFA can then run a concurrent straight KO League Cup format. That might mean the end of the domestic league cup competition, with domestic league and FA cup running.
 
I liked the fact Football produced 3 credible club champions and despite the waning interest towards the end, the fact UEFA have introduced the Conference indicates they realise theres just too many teams to have only 2 competitions at that level.
 
I used to love the champions league, whether we were in it or not, stopped watching back in tge early 2000s. It’s got progressively worse since tge 90s. All to keep a handful of countries happy.
 
BlueSevenTwo said:
Had it been retained chances are it would not have existed in the format you recall.
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Everything else changed!
However, maybe the name of the competition could have ensured it didn’t.
The CL being opened up included National cup winners too often though so there’d need to have been a way of making the CWC more in inviting, especially financially, more games etc.
That can be done as it has been done with the Europa League and now the Conference.
 
EnglishRanger said:
It's probably not practical to have it the way football is now but I always liked the competition and think it's a shame it ended. Obviously Rangers fans like it because of 1972 but leaving any bias aside there were some great matches and finals. One of the best finals I remember was Barcelona beating Fortuna Dusseldorf 4-3 aet in 1979.
Click to expand...
Nah, cup competitions have become so irrelevant to the big clubs and so many big clubs compete in the CL that it would be pretty poor standard these days. Best left in the past.
 
I would like a return to the old days of 3 competitions in a 2 legged kocokout format. Never going to happen though. Money has become the be all and end all for UEFA and the bigger clubs.
 
Corkinator said:
I used to love the champions league, whether we were in it or not, stopped watching back in tge early 2000s. It’s got progressively worse since tge 90s. All to keep a handful of countries happy.
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I find the CL group stage dull and only watch the knockout matches. It was even worse when there was the 2nd group stage as it seemed to drag on for ages before the knockout matches.
 
I just wish there was a proper 'Champions Cup/League', and 'Cup Winners Cup/League'. These would only have the league winners and cup winners in them.

You could let the 2-4th, etc. teams from other countries fight out the Europa. It'd make that competition far more legitimate and I think that any fears over it being the same teams/winners in the 'Champions Cup' wouldn't work out that way.
 
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