Dr Strangelove (or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love a Cup Run)

Jamie Cureton scored his first goal in an Orient shirt against Carlisle yesterday but there was absolutely nothing else positive for Orient that happened in the entire game that bears dwelling on. Going behind after just 52 seconds Orient were never in the game before Stephen Dawson, the driving force behind most comebacks over the last 18 months, limped off after 15 minutes, then back on and then finally off for good. Losing the inspirational skipper for any number of games is probably more serious than one away defeat, however resounding. The disastrous early months of the season when Dawson was absent and then struggled for match fitness showed just how important he is to the team. On the bright side it’ll give him plenty of time to sort out his new contract and the silver lining could be that the club hang on to him in the transfer window. Personally I think that a club would have to offer more money than Bournemouth did for Charlie Daniels for it to be worth losing the captain mid-season, regardless of the fact that he could walk away at the end of the season for free. Whatever money we receive for him could quickly be swallowed up if we ended up going down for lack of a leadr on the pitch.

Another poor defensive showing saw the Os ship 3 more goals before Cureton headed in Dean Cox’s free kick. But if you looking for that new cliche, positives, his goal may also have an impact on the bigger picture for Orient. Cureton missed two chances before finally taking his goal and if it restores his confidence and is the first of many Os fans may look on an awful day in Cumbria a little more fondly. As the rest of the football world focussed on the Third Round of the FA Cup this was the day that Orient were able to "concentrate on the league" and a push for the play offs. Conventional wisdom holds that if you are involved in a promotion or regulation battle, the FA Cup is just an unwanted distraction. The middle-classisation of football has seen the romance go out of the game, as the stands are filled with people familiar with risk assessments and mitigation measures. People don’t want the excitement of the Cup, they want to see their team consolidate its league position and avoid financially damaging relegation. The FA Cup has been damaged by football's equivalent of "health and safety guv". All of which might be sensible – were it true.

Not another Champiosnship side away

A year ago Orient knocked Premiership bound Norwich City out of the Cup. Injuries and tiredness weren't an issue, with the winter freeze leading to only 2 games being played in December – one of those the epic 8-2 win against Droylsden in the second round replay. The Os were in a similar league position as they are now but without any of the confidence that they wouldn’t be involved in the relegation dog fight, especially having been hammered 5-0 at Brighton on New Year’s Day. But even after knocking Norwich out, the common consensus after a disappointing fourth round draw, away again, at Swansea was that we’d have been better off going out and focussing on our league battle. But in the intervening two weeks the Os earned solid draws against Rochdale and MK Dons and took Sheffield Wednesday to pieces at Brisbane Road. When they then proceeded to dump Swansea out on their own ground, suddenly the distracting Cup run became the spring board for a run and the Os rode the momentum to the very edge of the play offs. Even the Arsenal games failed to have an immediate damaging impact – Orient earning a creditable draw at Huddersfield after the first game and winning 4 straight games after eventually being knocked out. The run was viewed as being key to our success. The only downside was the fixture congestion at the end of the year but was as much to do with the multiple postponements in November and December as it was the cup games.


An easily forgotten Third Round exit to Sheffield United in 2009 aside, last season was the first time in 5 years that Orient fans were able to get excited about the FA Cup. In the promotion season a dire second round victory at Rushden and Diamonds set up a London derby with Fulham. The Os went into the game in good form, sitting third in the league (the position they’d eventually finish in) and having won 4 of their last 5 games. But after beating Fulham the nerves set in when Orient were beaten by promotion rivals Northampton. However, the loss had more to do with the Brisbane Road pitch, which resembled Woolacombe Beach that season. Orient were set up to play football and that game in wet conditions was a battle in the trenches that the home team weren't up to. The nerves set in again after finally being knocked out by Charlton in the fourth round as Orient failed to register a win in their next four games. It turned out not to be terminal though and without that poor run automatic promotion would have been sealed long before the end of season clash with Oxford United and who would trade in that excitement just for a few wins in February?

Of course Orient’s most famous Cup run was in 1978, when a total of seven ties took them all of the way to the Semi Finals – not because they started in the First Round but as a result of needing replays against Norwich, Chelsea and Middlesbrough in the 3rd, 5th and 6th rounds respectively. The run wasn’t accompanied by a successful league challenge, quite the opposite. Orient finished 14th out of 22 teams in Division Two that year but incredibly avoided relegation by just a single point, with the Os, Luton, Notts County, Millwall, Charlton, Bristol Rovers AND Cardiff all finishing on 38 points, with Blackpool the unfortunate team on 37 points that ended up going down. You would think that Peter Kitchen’s goals were crucial but Orient scored fewer goals than any of their 38 point rivals (and the second least in the division). Despite his profligacy in the Cup Kitchen scored only 7 goals in the last 19 games of the 77/78 season, 3 of those a hat trick against Sheffield United in one of only 4 wins in that spell. It was the Orient defence who helped the team grind out the 9 draws that were crucial in keeping the team in Division Two, such was the value of a draw at a time when you got only 2 points for a win. Orient haven’t drawn as many as 18 games in a single season since 1978, despite now playing more games. But their form in the second half of the season mirrored that of the first and it was probably the fact that the team was first and foremost built around avoiding defeat stood them in good stead when it came to the Cup games and in just doing enough to avoid regulation.

Over the last ten seasons Orient have only made it through to the Third Round of the Cup 4 times and it can’t be a co-incidence that 2 of them have occured during 2 of the two most successful seasons in over 20 years. In fact in 3 of those 4 seasons the Os have finished in a higher or equal position in the league than they were before the Third Round. Compare that to the 6 seasons when Orient have failed to reach the Third Round. In 3 of those seasons Orient finished lower down the table than they were before they were knocked out of the Cup. In the other 3 they managed to climb 2 places up the table, to 20th in 06/07 and 17th in 09/10 and 1 place in 02/03. If recent history repeats itself Os fans might do well to be content with only climbing a place or two this season. The other side of that coin is that finishing lower than the 18th place Orient were in when Gillingham dumped them out of the Cup this season is likely to see them in the relegation zone.