Football's forgotten competitions: Where have you gone, Setana Sports Cup?

The Royal League was the flagship among theoretically attractive, innovative competitions, but they were shattered by the harsh reality of football. Even in the final of the first edition in 2004, the stands at Gothenburg's venerable Ullevi stadium were shockingly deserted. FC Copenhagen's celebrations seemed at times artificial, and the stage set up for the trophy presentation was scandalously improvised. Players, administrators, and fans seemed never to be able to fully shake off the tournament's more artificial than organic character.

The idea behind the pan-Scandinavian tournament was to reduce revenue losses during the cold, football-poor months. The field consisted of the four best-placed teams from the national leagues of Sweden, Norway, and Denmark. While the competition in Sweden and Norway followed on from the completed league season, the Danish clubs had to schedule their competitive matches right in the middle of their ongoing season.

The pan-Scandinavian project was originally planned to run for five years, but was discontinued after three seasons because no TV partner willing to pay could be found.

Ireland and Northern Ireland have a turbulent, charged history, full of wounds and deep rifts that have yet to heal. This applies politically, but it also applies to football. Because the two countries cannot meet in league play, the so-called "All-Ireland derbies" occur only very rarely. The Setana Sports Cup, named after a now-defunct Irish TV provider, attempted to fill this market gap in 2005.

At the beginning of the Irish season and the end of the Northern Irish season, the best teams from both leagues competed in group, knockout, and final matches. Irish clubs clearly dominated the competition overall. While clubs were lured by high prize money (€150,000 for the winner) in the early years, the prize pool for the last edition in 2014 was only €73,000. The competition ended with the postponement of the 2015 edition. Since then, there have been repeated plans to reactivate the format, but these have never been implemented.

For exactly one hundred years, the United Kingdom's national teams competed year after year for their own royal cup: the British Home Championship (BHC). The participants were England, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland (from 1950, Northern Ireland), and the format was as simple as possible: The four national teams each played each other once, with two points for a win and one point for a draw.

Because goal difference was irrelevant at the beginning, curious situations often arose. The 1955/56 season stands out in particular, when all nations won one match and drew two. The only logical consequence: all teams were crowned British Champions. Since the "say no to goal difference" rule was changed in 1978, there have never been two or more winners in the few editions since then.

The emerging and increasingly important European and World Championships gradually undermined the relevance of the British Home Championship. In 1983, England and Scotland announced that they would no longer participate in the BHC—the final nail in the coffin for the competition.

The UEFA-CAF Meridian Cup featured an even more unusual format: After variously designed tournaments featuring eight U18 national teams were held from 1997 to 2005, the last edition in 2007 culminated in the grand finale of this creative tournament design: an African team competed twice against a European U18 All-Star team. UEFA's 20-man squad included the trio of Marko Marin, Wojciech Szczęsny, and Bojan Krkić. The European teams dominated the national team encounters until 2005, as well as the two All-Star Games in 2007. The final score was 10-1 over both matches.

The competition was organized by the European and African continental associations as part of an exchange and development program. Since the cooperation agreement expired in 2007, the tournament has not been held.

This competition is so wonderfully arbitrary and devoid of any apparent meaning that one actually wishes it were back: the Anglo-Italian Cup. Between 1970 and 1996, Italian and English teams of various professional levels competed. While between 1970 and 1973, top teams from both countries competed against each other, between 1976 and 1986, only semi-professional teams competed. During this time, the Italian teams from Serie C dominated their fifth-tier English opponents. In 1992, the competition made one last stand, but after four years, it was finally laid to rest for the third and final time.

The clashes were often overshadowed by violence between and by fans. The first final of the competition in 1970, with Swindon Town leading 3-0 against Napoli, had to be abandoned shortly before full-time due to rioting fans. Curiously, in the early years of the competition, teams received one point for each goal scored, and the offside rule, which was a life-threatening offense, only applied in the penalty area. The underlying idea behind these interpretations of the rules was to create incentives for attacking football.

This competition, held from 2003 to 2007, was open to the champions of Japan, Korea, and China, as well as one other team from the host nation. The tournament followed a free-for-all format and produced a glorious winner after a week of football. South Korean teams were the most successful, winning three tournaments in five editions.

The Pan-Pacific Championship attempted to fill the gap in the Pacific market for four-team tournaments, but wasted this opportunity with even less staying power than the A3 Champions Cup. The tournament for clubs from Oceania countries was first held in 2008 and last held in 2009.

Originally, the league champions of the MLS (USA and Canada), the K-League (South Korea), the J-League (Japan), and the A-League (Australia and New Zealand) were to participate. However, the first edition consisted of only two national champions, and in the second edition, contrary to the original plans, a Chinese club participated.

After the two semifinals, a final and a third-place play-off took place. Gamba Osaka won the coveted trophy in 2008, and in 2009, the South Korean club Suwon Bluewings won after a dramatic penalty shootout against LA Galaxy.

In 1997, a spiritual and creative epiphany occurred in the offices of the German Football League (DFL): The new savior, known as the "DFL League Cup," was created from nothing. The one-week tournament before the end of the summer break was instantly elevated to the third most important title in German football. The competition never descended from this high ground until its abolition in 2007.

The six-team format featured the top five teams from the previous Bundesliga season, along with the cup winner. After a preliminary round between the 2nd and 5th-placed teams in the league, the league champions and cup winners joined in the semifinals. While Bayern Munich were the record winners with six titles, the competition's second-most successful team, Hertha Berlin, surprised everyone. The reasons for its discontinuation in 2008 were the competition's lack of relevance, weak attendances, and the severe restrictions the League Cup placed on preseason preparation.