\n<\/p>\n
T<\/span>he Women\u2019s League Cup group stage kicks off on Wednesday with 10 matches between Women\u2019s Super League and Women\u2019s Super League 2 teams, excluding those competing in the Champions League, with minimal fanfare. It is a tournament that has lost its way a little, which lacks a strong identity, struggling to compete with heavily marketed WSL, WSL2 and FA Cup fixtures, and which doesn\u2019t garner much love from fans unless their club wins it.<\/p>\n It is understood that WSL Football is consideringthe future of the League Cup. Over the years the idea of scrapping the competition has raised its head at various times as those concerned have grappled with where it fits in the women\u2019s football ecosystem.<\/p>\n There is some logic to the thought that instead of having to share the investment in women\u2019s football across multiple competitions it could, and should, be focused on building up the \u2018hero product\u2019 \u2013 in the case of WSL Football, WSL and WSL2, and in the case of the Football Association, the FA Cup. The football calendar is also tight, with available matchdays a premium resource.<\/p>\n However, losing the League Cup removes an already limited opportunity for silverware, albeit only three teams, Arsenal, Chelsea and Manchester City, have won the competition since its rebrand from the FA Women\u2019s Premier League Cup in 2011. Ditching it would also deny teams the possibility of a domestic treble, a feat Chelsea achieved last season in Sonia Bompastor\u2019s first year in charge, an achievement that is highly regarded and keeps the number of trophies available in England aligned with other key European nations. Another positive is that the League Cup group stage gives teams in the WSL2 and outside the top three in the WSL more games to play, which helps with the issue of player underloading.<\/p>\n What is clear is that, at the very least, the League Cup needs a boost and has done so for some time. The new title sponsorship deal with Subway has helped in this regard, with their giveaways proving popular among fans. But that is simply not enough. The group stage is undoubtedly a big issue, with the arbitrary geographical splits not really working; too many teams means that one group has five teams while the rest have four. There is also no consistent broadcasting of games (Sky Sports have the rights as part of the WSL deal).<\/p>\n The point scoring is also odd. Currently during the group stage, a winner gets three points, but if a game ends in a draw both teams get a point and a penalty shootout takes place with the winner earning an additional point. Confused? You\u2019re not alone.<\/p>\n Another frustration is that teams competing in the Champions League get a bye and enter at the quarter-final stage, meaning they can win the competition having only played three games. This season it is Arsenal, Chelsea and Manchester United that join after the group stage is concluded and with only one team from each group progressing to join them, the likelihood of a cupset of any significance is minimal.<\/p>\n Switching to a more traditional straight knockout competition would alleviate many of the issues the tournament faces, injecting much-needed jeopardy into every matchday, and subsequently increasing the chance of a WSL2 side tipping over the applecart.<\/p>\n skip past newsletter promotion<\/p>\n Sign up to Moving the Goalposts<\/span><\/p>\n No topic is too small or too big for us to cover as we deliver a twice-weekly roundup of the wonderful world of women\u2019s football<\/p>\n Privacy Notice: <\/strong>Newsletters may contain information about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. If you do not have an account, we will create a guest account for you on theguardian.com to send you this newsletter. You can complete full registration at any time. For more information about how we use your data see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.<\/span><\/p>\n after newsletter promotion<\/p>\n The WSL and WSL2 are growing and have a pathway to further growth; the League Cup now needs heads to swing their way, too. For that to occur, the competition needs a rethink and a bit more love.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Women\u2019s League Cup group stage kicks off on Wednesday with 10 matches between Women\u2019s Super League and Women\u2019s Super League 2 teams, excluding those competing in the Champions League, with minimal fanfare. It is a tournament that has lost its way a little, which lacks a strong identity, struggling to compete with heavily marketed<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":23407,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[53],"tags":[130,14277,7916,1413,14276,3504,1214,8140],"class_list":{"0":"post-23406","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-cup","9":"tag-ecosystem","10":"tag-fit","11":"tag-football","12":"tag-grappling","13":"tag-league","14":"tag-womens","15":"tag-wsl"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23406","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=23406"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23406\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/23407"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=23406"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=23406"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=23406"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}