National Anthems Banned for Cup Final

The Football League have declared that national anthems will not be sung ahead of Sunday’s Carling Cup final.

Liverpool, England’s representatives, take on Championship outfit Cardiff who make the trip to Wembley as Wales’ ambassadors in the showpiece event.

The league said it was protocol to block out anthems at finals because there have been incidents in the past between clubs from different nations and where fans have booed each other’s anthems.

"It is the long-standing policy of the Football League not to play national anthems when English and Welsh clubs meet in finals.” A spokesman from the Football League said.

"The League regards these matches as domestic rather than international occasions and introduced this policy after fans failed to respect both anthems at previous finals."

Other finals where the anthems have not been played include last year's Championship play-off final between Reading and Swansea, and the policy goes back to the 2003 Division Two play-off final between Cardiff and QPR.

Reading and Swansea played out last year’s Championship play-off final and faced similar restrictions with regards to anthems. Cardiff and QPR also experiences the muting of anthems in 2003 during their Division Two play-off final.

Comments

[Kopite_Cymraeg]

If there was ever a fixture where this is least likely to happen then this is it. Most Liverpool fans couldnt care less about the queen, we'd rather sing YNWA. Pretty sure Cardiff fans wouldn't mind, and what with Liverpool having many welsh stars through the past and present + the geographical location of Liverpool to Wales I doubt there'd be any untowards feelings from the kopites.