The Coupe de la Ligue (), known outside France as the French League Cup, was a

knockout A knockout (abbreviated to KO or K.O.) is a fight-ending, winning criterion in several full-contact combat sports, such as boxing, kickboxing, muay thai, mixed martial arts, karate, some forms of taekwondo and other sports involving strikin ...

cup competition in French football organized by the Ligue de Football Professionnel. The tournament was established in 1993 and, unlike the Coupe de France, was only open to professional clubs in France which play in country's top three football divisions, though the

third Third or 3rd may refer to: Numbers * 3rd, the ordinal form of the cardinal number 3 * , a fraction of one third * 1⁄60 of a ''second'', or 1⁄3600 of a ''minute'' Places * 3rd Street (disambiguation) * Third Avenue (disambiguation) * Hi ...

is not fully professional. The most successful team in the competition was Paris Saint-Germain with nine wins, including the last edition in 2019–20. The LFP voted to suspend the competition indefinitely to "reduce the season schedule".

Precursors

Another competition named Coupe de la Ligue existed from 1963 to 1965. In 1982, a Coupe d'Eté (Summer cup) was held before the start of the French league season; the cup was won by

Stade Laval Stade Lavallois Mayenne Football Club (), also referred to as Stade Laval or simply Laval, is a French association football club based in Laval in western France. The club was formed on 17 July 1902 and currently plays in Ligue 2, the second ...

. This tournament continued under the name of Coupe de la Ligue, until 1994, before the beginning of the French season.

History

The tournament in its last format started in 1994 and was initiated by the professional teams because of their displeasure with the Coupe de France, thanks to its built-in home advantage for teams playing in the lower leagues. Entrance to the UEFA Cup, now called the

UEFA Europa League The UEFA Europa League (abbreviated as UEL, or sometimes, UEFA EL), formerly the UEFA Cup, is an annual football club competition organised since 1971 by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) for eligible European football clubs. ...

, was offered to the winning team. Its first winner was Paris Saint-Germain, after their 2–0 victory over Bastia. The first final decided by a penalty shootout was in 1996 when

Metz Metz ( , , lat, Divodurum Mediomatricorum, then ) is a city in northeast France located at the confluence of the Moselle and the Seille rivers. Metz is the prefecture of the Moselle department and the seat of the parliament of the Grand ...

beat

Lyon Lyon,, ; Occitan: ''Lion'', hist. ''Lionés'' also spelled in English as Lyons, is the third-largest city and second-largest metropolitan area of France. It is located at the confluence of the rivers Rhône and Saône, to the northwest of ...

. The first three finals were held at

Parc des Princes Parc des Princes () is an all-seater football stadium in Paris, France, in the south-west of the French capital, inside the 16th arrondissement, near the Stade Jean-Bouin and Stade Roland Garros. The stadium, with a seating capacity of 47 ...

; from 1998 edition until 2015, the finals have been held at the

Stade de France The Stade de France (, ) is the national stadium of France, located just north of Paris in the commune of Saint-Denis. Its seating capacity of 80,698 makes it the sixth-largest stadium in Europe. The stadium is used by the France national foo ...

Strasbourg Strasbourg (, , ; german: Straßburg ; gsw, label= Bas Rhin Alsatian, Strossburi , gsw, label= Haut Rhin Alsatian, Strossburig ) is the prefecture and largest city of the Grand Est region of eastern France and the official seat of the ...

and Paris Saint-Germain won the competition at both stadiums.

Gueugnon Gueugnon () is a commune in the Saône-et-Loire department in the region of Bourgogne-Franche-Comté in eastern France. Population Economy The primary industry in the town is a stainless-steel factory run by Aperam. A huge part of Gueugnon ...

became the first team below the top division of France to win the cup after beating Paris Saint-Germain in the 2000 final. Overall, there were 14 winners of the competition since its inception. For over 20 years from its inception, finals of the tournament were only held in the Paris area: the first three were at the

and the rest at the

. This changed in September 2016 when the LFP announced that the next three finals would be held in Lyon, Bordeaux and Lille respectively. The LFP suspended the competition indefinitely after the 2019–20 season, to reduce fixture congestion. In the last final in 2020, Paris Saint-Germain and Lyon drew 0–0 and the former won 6–5 on penalties.

Winners

Records

*Most tournament wins (team): 9, Paris Saint-Germain *Most final appearances (team): 10, Paris Saint-Germain *Most tournament wins (player): 6, Edinson Cavani, Marquinhos, Thiago Silva and Marco Verratti (2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018 and 2020) *Most tournament wins (manager): 4, Didier Deschamps (2003, 2010, 2011 and 2012) and

Laurent Blanc Laurent Robert Blanc (born 19 November 1965) is a French professional football manager and former player who played as a centre-back, and is currently the manager of Ligue 1 club Lyon. He has the nickname ''Le Président'', which was given to hi ...

(2009, 2014, 2015 and 2016) *All-time top goalscorer (player): Edinson Cavani and Pauleta, 15 goals each *Most goals scored in a season (player): 7, Stéphane Guivarc'h (1997–98) *Most goals scored in the final (player): 8, Edinson Cavani (2 in 2014, 2 in 2015, 2 in 2017, 2 in 2018)

References

External links

Coupe de la Ligue information on LFP.fr
{{National football (soccer) league cups Recurring sporting events established in 1994 1994 establishments in France 2020 disestablishments in France Recurring sporting events disestablished in 2020 Defunct football competitions in France Defunct football cup competitions