The 2008–09 Irish League Cup (known as the Co-operative Insurance Cup for sponsorship reasons) was the 23rd edition of the

Irish League Cup The Northern Ireland Football League Cup (known as the BetMcLean Cup for sponsorship purposes, and commonly known as the Irish League Cup) is a national football knock-out cup competition in Northern Ireland open to all member clubs of the ...

Northern Ireland Northern Ireland ( ; ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, part of the United Kingdom in the north-east of the island of Ireland. It has been #Descriptions, variously described as a country, province or region. Northern Ireland shares Repub ...

's secondary

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

knock-out cup competition. The tournament started on 26 August 2008 with the qualifying round and ended on 28 February 2009 with the final. Linfield were the defending champions after their ninth League Cup win last season; a 3–2 victory over

Crusaders The Crusades were a series of religious wars initiated, supported, and at times directed by the Papacy during the Middle Ages. The most prominent of these were the campaigns to the Holy Land aimed at reclaiming Jerusalem and its surrounding ...

in the previous final. This season Linfield went out at the quarter-final stage to eventual winners

Portadown Portadown ( ) is a town in County Armagh, Northern Ireland. The town is based on the River Bann in the north of the county, about southwest of Belfast. It is in the Armagh City, Banbridge and Craigavon Borough Council area and had a population ...

, who defeated Newry City 1–0 in the final. This was Portadown's second League Cup win, and first one since 1995–96. This was also only the second time in twelve years that the cup had not been won by one of

Belfast's Big Two The Big Two derby, also referred to simply as the Big Two or Bel Classico, is the name given to the association football derby between Belfast clubs, Linfield and Glentoran. The derby is also sometimes referred to as the Belfast derby. They ar ...

. The competition was expanded this season and the format was also changed due to a re-structuring of the league system. 29 clubs were now eligible to take part in the competition; the 12 members of the

IFA Premiership The NIFL Premiership, known as the Sports Direct Premiership for sponsorship purposes, and Irish Premiership colloquially, is a professional association football league which operates as the highest division of the Northern Ireland Football L ...

and the 17 members of the

IFA Championship The Northern Ireland Football League Championship (known as the Playr-Fit Championship for sponsorship reasons) is the second level of the Northern Ireland Football League, the national football league in Northern Ireland. Clubs in the Champion ...

, with the Premiership clubs entering in the third round. The group stage format used in previous seasons was dropped in favour of home and away two-legged aggregate score ties with an

away goals rule The away goals rule is a method of tiebreaking in association football and other sports when teams play each other twice, once at each team's home ground. Under the away goals rule, if the total goals scored by each team are equal, the team that ...

Qualifying round

The qualifying round was held in order to reduce the number of teams competing in the first round to 16. The match was played on 26 August 2008.

First round

In this round entered the winners from the previous round, Glebe Rangers, as well as the remaining 15 teams from the

. The first legs were played on 29 and 30 August 2008. The second legs were played on 2, 3 and 9 September 2008.

Second round

In this round entered the eight winners from the previous round. The first legs were played on 20 September 2008. The second legs were played on 23, 24 September and 1 October 2008.

Third round

In this round entered the four winners from the previous round, together with the 12 members of the

. The first legs were played on 21, 22, 28 and 29 October 2008. The second legs were played on 4, 5, 11 and 12 November 2008.

Quarter-finals

The first legs were played on 2 and 3 December 2008. The second legs were played on 16 and 17 December 2008.

Qualifying round

First round

Second round

Third round

Quarter-finals

Semi-finals

Final

References