Football cuppers: Fitz and John’s off to a healthy start

Cuppers is the name given to any intercollegiate knockout competition. There are now Cuppers competitions in many different sports, but the college football tournament is the oldest and most prestigious.

The final takes place in Lent term but Saturday saw the first round as 18 colleges took to the field. The random draw gave Pembroke, Jesus, Caius, Selwyn, Peterhouse, Clare and Homerton byes into Round 2.

Clare Hall 0-3 Girton

Clare Hall is the smallest college and don’t field a football team in any of the 7 divisions. Girton dealt with them comfortably as they continued their strong start to the season.

St. John’s 5-0 Corpus Christi

CUAFC rules dictate that players in the Blues’ squads cannot play in league fixtures but can play in Cuppers. John’s, whose squad includes numerous Blues players,  can, therefore, field a much stronger Cuppers team than they do in the league. Last year’s winners had no problem dispatching Corpus.

Fitzwilliam 7-1 Downing

Fitz, like John’s, are considerably strengthened by their returning Blues’ players. Downing were the unfortunate visitors as they were comprehensively dumped out of Cuppers.

Fitz winning Cuppers in 2013: “No, give me the trophy!”

Magdalene 5-3 King’s

Division 4 Magdalene claimed the shock result of the round as they beat Division 2 King’s in an eight-goal thriller.

Christ’s 0-1 Darwin

Darwin is currently second bottom of Division 2 while Christ’s top Division 3. This match was as close as those league position predicted,  with the grads narrowly coming out on top.

St Catharine’s 4-0 Trinity Hall

Tit Hall’s season took another bad turn as they were soundly beaten by Catz. They have now lost their first three games of the season and relegation from Division 1 is a real threat.

Trinity 0-3 Queens’

A strong performance from Queens’ ensured there was no shock result for Trinity.

Emmanuel 1-4 Robinson

This all Division 2 encounter saw Robinson comfortably dispatch Emma. Robinson has now won all three of their games this season with a combined goal difference of +12. If they continue in this form, they’ll easily be promoted to the Premier League

The draw for the second round looks like this:

So much anticipation.

The ties will be played on the 28th and 29th November.