Forest Green Rovers manager Steve Cotterill has suggested getting rid of injury time before extra time in the FA Cup after a 2-1 loss to Stockport in the 1st Round of the FA Cup last weekend.
Rovers conceded a 97th minute goal in extra time from Kyle Wootton after nine minutes of added time, a scenario Cotterill was keen to avoid.
“The only thing I would change, and I think most managers would probably go for this is that when you know that you’re going to go straight into extra time, you there’s no need to play any injury time at the end of that 90 minutes.
“You could just have your break, and then you could go into your two 15 minutes and take it from there, I don’t believe on 90 minutes last week that you get another nine minutes on top of the 90, and then another 30 minutes on top of the nine,” added the former Shrewsbury Town head coach.
“And I know people can say, well, you can score after nine minutes, well, then they might score at nine minutes into the first part of extra time. “
⏱️ 90′ NINE minutes of additional time to be played.
— Forest Green Rovers (@FGRFC_Official) November 2, 2024
1-1 | #WeAreFGR💚
Cotterill also claimed that the removal of replays was a good thing for clubs, despite the missed opportunities from multiple lower league clubs missing out on trips to larger clubs a week ago, including his very own team.
“Well, you would normally have a replay to look forward to, then you add another cup, and then you add another league, and then another cup, and then another cup and just for good measure, we might as well put another cup on top of that.
“So I’ve got no problem with the FA Cup or anything like that, the traditional big competition, I thought the way they did it, having extra time and then penalties, I think is correct, I think the replay only puts more stress and more strain on on your team.”
List of non-league clubs (so far) robbed of an FA Cup replay:
— The Lower Tiers (@LowerTiers) November 3, 2024
Braintree Town
Weston-super-Mare
Hednesford Town
Maidenhead United
Southend United
Guiseley
Forest Green
These clubs have been robbed of extra ticket money, a chance to win an invaluable amount of prize money for…
Despite not progressing to the next round the Rovers still put in an impressive display against a team from two leagues above, but it’s all about putting performances into points away to Maidenhead this weekend.
“Well, you always wanna replicate the same performance even if you haven’t had a good result, but sometimes you don’t have a good result, but you want the same performance kind of thing.
“So you know, we’ll just go into every game like we always do, preparing to do well in every game and this week has been no different.
“So we do know it’ll be a difficult game.“
Maidenhead sit 19th in the National League, winning four and drawing four from 16 games so far, but Cotteril is not fooled by their league position.
“So certainly not. You know, I think Alan’s done a really good job down there and he’s been there a while now so I am full of respect and admiration for for what they do there.
