Southern Summer Cup should be revamped

The southern Summer Cup should be revamped to the format that existed some years ago.

The restructuring of the Premier League and Division One to eight-team competitions lends itself to such a revamp.

The competition should be organised along the lines of the old 16-team World Cup tournament, before that competition was changed to accommodate, first, 24 teams, and then 32.

With eight Premier League clubs and eight Division One clubs now on the horizon, four groups of four teams would be an ideal set-up for the Summer Cup.

The four top Premier League sides would be seeded, and two Division One clubs would be drawn in each of the four groups.

The remaining four Premier League sides would each be in different groups.

That makes for pretty good groupings and caters for giant-killing feats by the lesser teams, and everyone is still assured a minumum of three games, just as is the case now.

The advantage is that one could then have the top two sides in each group progressing to the quarterfinals.

These would be followed by semi-finals and the final.

This is how it used to be, and it made for an exciting tournament.

The problem with the current set-up is that, after the group games, only the two group leaders meet in the final.

There are no semi-finals even, which is disappointing.

And, the outcome of a group is often known early on and some of the better teams are eliminated much too soon.

It's too late to change this year's competition, but surely it's worth considering a return to the old format for next year.

Another advantage is that teams face a much broader range of opponents in the group stages.

Many coaches say they take the tournament with a pinch of salt and that it's only a series of practice games.

Well, the older format fits in with that philosophy, too, because teams from a different league are opponents and there is the potential for more than just three or four games.