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English Football League boss Shaun Harvey has defended the decision to rig the draw for next season’s Checkatrade Trophy in order to avoid a Portsmouth-Southampton clash, saying the clubs had requested it.
The south coast rivals have not played each other since April 2012, when they drew 2-2 in the Championship, and with Pompey in League One and the Saints in the Premier League the regionalised Checkatrade Trophy was the most likely forum for their next meeting.
The competition, which has traditionally been a knockout for League One and League Two sides, was revamped last summer to include 16 invited under-21 teams from clubs with category-one academies.
That experiment has been extended, with some notable tweaks, for the next two seasons and the draw to decide which four-team group the invited sides would join was made in London on Wednesday.
But before the draw started for the eight southern groups, Southampton’s ball was removed from the pot and a separate draw was made for group A, which already featured Charlton, Crawley and Portsmouth, and Fulham was picked.
After that, the southern draw preceded as normal, with Southampton eventually going into group H with Cambridge, Northampton and Peterborough - three teams which enjoy their own lively rivalry. In fact, Swansea were drawn in Newport’s group and Grimsby and Scunthorpe are in the same group in the northern half of the competition.
Speaking to reporters after the draw, Harvey said: "One of the commitments we made, right at the outset, was to try to avoid group-stage games that had a significant potential for high levels of disorder.
“Previous experience with Portsmouth-Southampton games, particularly when talking to Portsmouth, was that there does appear to be potential for that when they’re drawn together. So if we could avoid that in the group stages then it was a conscious decision that we should do so.”
When asked about the other local rivalries, Harvey said the view from the clubs involved was the risks were not “significant” and could be “managed”.
The irony, however, is that last season’s Checkatrade Trophy was dogged by poor attendances, especially in the group stages, and fierce derbies could be an ideal way to generate some enthusiasm.
“We want a profile for the competition but it’s about balancing risk,” said Harvey.
"We could have crossed our fingers and we would have had a one-in-eight chance but we did say we would look at the structure of the groups to avoid that particular issue.
“They could meet each other later in the competition, in which case it’s a straight knockout draw and the game will go ahead on that basis. But why create the potential for negative publicity around the game if you don’t need to?”
On the wider issue of the competition’s value, Harvey was confident lessons have been learned from the mixed results of last season’s experiment.
On the one hand, the new format did provide more opportunities for youngsters to play first-team football and the positive feedback from those invited clubs that took part last season has tempted Chelsea, Manchester City and Spurs to join this year.
The EFL clubs also benefited from the Premier League’s financial support for the idea in the form of increased prize money and that pot has been sweetened further, with a total of £3million now available for the 48 clubs to fight over.
But, on the other hand, fears that the introduction of Premier League youngsters into an EFL competition was a precursor to B teams joining the league pyramid led to fan boycotts and attendances, particularly in the group stages, were poor.
There was also considerable grumbling from EFL managers when they were fined for fielding under-strength teams in a competition intended to help player development.
That complaint has been addressed, however, as the full-strength requirement for EFL teams is more flexible next season - there should be no repeats of the embarrassing scenes that saw goalkeepers substituted in the opening minutes of games, for example.
Harvey admitted that some of the problems were a result of the league failing to communicate its objectives but said he was encouraged by the fact that two thirds of EFL clubs voted to continue with the concept of invited teams, the backing he received from the Football Association and Premier League and the happy ending provided by 74,000 fans watching Coventry beat Oxford at Wembley in April.
“There will always be some supporters who believe the competition should only be for League One and League Two clubs and it should be the traditional route for small clubs to get to Wembley - it’s a valid view they’re entitled to hold,” he said.
“But I’m hoping that when we get the message out about what we’re trying to achieve, the crowds will increase and they won’t have to go too far to get back to where they were for this competition in the past.”
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