July 20: The FA Cup in Born

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The FA Cup is the oldest national knockout tournament was born on this day in soccer history in 1871 when FA secretary Charles William Alcock put forward the idea.

“It is desirable that a Challenge Cup should be established in connection with the Association, for which all clubs belonging to the Association should be invited to compete,” Alcock said.

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In the first year of the competition only 15 teams entered, compared to over 600 in the modern era, and it was Alcock’s team the Wanderers team that defeated the Royal Engineers 1-0 at the Kennington Oval to win the first FA Cup title in 1872.

Soccer Birthdays

1938 – Roger Hunt, English footballer
1973 – Claudio Reyna, American soccer player
1973 – Mads Rieper, Danish footballer
1975 – Erik Hagen, Norwegian footballer
1977 – Kiki Musampa, Congolese footballer
1977 – Alessandro dos Santos, naturalized Japanese footballer
1979 – Miklos Feher, Hungarian football player (d. 2004)
1981 – Damien Delaney, Irish footballer