‘English football will move closer to a mid-winter break when the Football Association discusses the idea at its annual meeting in Bournemouth on Saturday.”If that sounds familiar, it was in fact a story from June 1995 — so just 23 more years of pleading with the top clubs before the FA could finally stand on the brink of a breakthrough. It has taken more than two decades and the concession of moving the FA Cup fifth round to midweek, with no replays, to make the idea palatable to the top flight in time for the 2019-20 campaign. Worth the wait? You would hope so, after all the palaver, but to assume that the England team have just taken a decisive stride towards winning a…

Source: The Times March 02, 2018 00:04 UTC