Anglo-Scottish Cup

The Anglo-Scottish Cup was a tournament arranged for teams in the English and Scottish football leagues during the summer for several years during the 1970s. It was created in 1975 as a new incarnation of the Texaco Cup, with a similar format to its predecessor, but involving clubs from England and Scotland only.

The competition made every attempt to maintain the status of a top-level tournament. Newcastle United were expelled from the 1976–77 competition for playing a weakened team in the first leg of their quarter-final against Ayr United. Over the years, however, English entrants were increasingly drawn from the lower divisions, and in 1981 the Scottish clubs withdrew as the public showed little interest in the competition. As the final winners, Chesterfield still hold the trophy and it is displayed in their Board Room. The competition continued, with English clubs only, as the Football League Group Cup.^{[citation needed]}

In the 1987–88 season, an attempt was made to revive the competition as the Anglo-Scottish Challenge, pitting the holders of the FA Cup and Scottish Cup against each other, but after a poor attendance for the first leg between Coventry City and St Mirren the competition was shelved, with the second leg never played.

Nottingham Forest’s victory in the 1976-77 final over Orient was their first trophy under the management of Brian Clough, who later stated that he took the tournament seriously (when many other clubs did not) and considered it the springboard for Forest's future success, as they would go on to win a First Division title and two European Cups over the following three seasons. Clough had taken a similar stance on the competition's predecessor, the Texaco Cup, and won it with Derby County in 1972, the same year he guided them to their first league title.

The format of the competition remained constant throughout the six years of its existence, and indeed the format was the same as the last edition of its forerunner, the Texaco Cup.

Sixteen English clubs competed in four groups of four, with the winners of each group qualifying for the quarter-finals. Clubs played each of the other teams in their group once, with two points awarded for a win, one for a draw, and a bonus point for each side that scored three or more goals in a single match.

Eight Scottish League clubs played a two-legged knock-out round, with the aggregate winners of each tie qualifying to the overall quarter-finals. For the overall quarter-finals, each club was paired against a club from the other country and the tournament then progressed in a knock-out format, with each tie (including the final) being played over two legs.

In the early years, around half of the English clubs were drawn from that season's First Division (excepting clubs playing in Europe), although by the latter years of the tournament only two or three top-level English sides were playing, with participation stretching down to Third and Fourth Division sides.^{[citation needed]}