FourFourTwo's Deputy Editor watched his club win non-Wembley semi-finals in the 90s, but wants the fixtures to remain at the national stadium
Wembley Stadium has hosted FA Cup semi finals since 2008(Image credit: Getty Images)
A Wembley of the north? No thanks, Sir Jim Ratcliffe. Didn’t the British taxpayer already fork out for West Ham’s stadium this millennium? Let’s not make the same mistake twice by funding a new Old Trafford.
I live in the North East but want our national stadium to remain in the capital. Big football occasions deserve big stages, big cities, big days out and Wembley is the biggest, most famous away day in football – and, frankly, easier for people in the North East to get to than most major cities in the North.
Wembley is a pilgrimage that’s been paid for more than a century and that should be protected. Yes, the stadium is unrecognisable from The Empire Stadium of old, but it’s still a venue to be proud of and an enjoyable supporter experience to boot.
Wembley is a pilgramage, whatever the round of the FA Cup (Image credit: Getty Images)
How do you protect that? By funding it with events and adding to its rich history with sporting and cultural theatre. Periods of inactivity put it at risk of turning into Old Trafford. A big, iconic stadium supposedly in so much disrepair that they need to knock it down and start again.
People complain that the FA Cup has lost its prestige. It has to some extent, but let’s leave the carrot of a day out at Wembley where it is for the semi-finals. I saw my club win two FA Cup semis at Old Trafford in the ’90s – great days, but I don’t want a return to club stadiums for that stage of the competition.
I’ve also attended dozens of Wembley FA Cup semis in a working capacity, and they’re some of the loudest football matches I’ve ever been to. Two sets of fans, 40,000 allocations screaming their way to a cup final. No other venue in England gives you that.
An exterior view of the Stretford end stand at Old Trafford (Image credit: Robbie Jay Barratt - AMA/Getty Images)
I don’t support either Manchester club, Arsenal, Liverpool, Chelsea or Tottenham. If fans of the big clubs are ‘bored’ of trips to Wembley, that’s their problem. There’s more to English football than them.
Five EFL clubs have never played at the new Wembley – Ipswich might yet change that via this season’s play-offs, so let’s have a Blackburn vs Accrington Stanley FA Cup semi-final next term, with the winners playing Crawley or Colchester. With a last four like that, who would dare say the FA Cup has lost its magic?
A former goalkeeper, Ketch joined FourFourTwo as Deputy Editor in 2022 having worked across ChronicleLive, LeedsLive, Hull Daily Mail, YorkshireLive, Teesside Gazette and the Huddersfield Examiner as a Northern Football Editor. Prior to that he was the Senior Writer at BBC Match of the Day magazine. He has interviewed the likes of Harry Kane, Trent Alexander-Arnold, Gareth Southgate and attended two World Cup finals and a Champions League final. He has been a Newcastle United season ticket holder since 2000 and has an expensive passion for collecting classic football shirts.
