The Scottish Cup Fifth Round is done, the Quarter-Final draw is confirmed, and the usual suspects have progressed. Celtic, Rangers, Aberdeen — all through, all looking comfortable, all doing exactly what clubs with their budgets should do against lower-league opposition. No shocks. No romance. Just business.
Dundee United faced The Spartans today, Aberdeen host Motherwell tomorrow night at Pittodrie, and the rest of the round played out over the past couple of weeks. Celtic handled Dundee on the 7th, Rangers dispatched Stranraer on the 8th, and Airdrieonians took on St Mirren on the 6th. The magic of the cup, they call it.
The TV Problem
Here’s what gets me every year. The Scottish Cup is supposed to be the people’s tournament — the great equaliser where Stenhousemuir can dream of facing Celtic at Hampden. So why is half of it locked behind Premier Sports? Celtic’s match was on Premier Sports. Rangers’ match was on Premier Sports. If you wanted to watch the two biggest games of the round, you needed a subscription that most casual fans don’t have.
BBC Scotland picked up Airdrieonians v St Mirren and Stenhousemuir v Falkirk — credit where it’s due, those are proper cup ties with genuine drama. But the flagship fixtures? Behind a paywall. The SFA needs to ask itself a serious question: is the money from Premier Sports worth more than the exposure of having every Scottish football fan able to watch their national cup competition?
The Quarter-Finals
Details are confirmed and we’ll see how the draw shakes out. The hope, as always, is for a lower-league side to pull something extraordinary. The Spartans, if they got through against Dundee United, would be the story of the tournament. Scottish football needs these moments — they remind us why we bother with the early rounds in the first place.
But mostly, we need to be able to actually watch them when they happen.