The 2005 Setanta Cup was the first edition of the

Setanta Sports Cup The Setanta Sports Cup was a club football (soccer), football competition featuring teams from both football associations on the island of Ireland. Inaugurated in 2005, it was a cross-border competition between clubs in the League of Ireland from ...

, a club

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 ...

competition featuring teams from both football associations on the island of

Ireland Ireland (, ; ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe. Geopolitically, the island is divided between the Republic of Ireland (officially Names of the Irish state, named Irelan ...

. It was inaugurated as a cross-border competition between clubs from the

League of Ireland The League of Ireland is a national association football Sports league, league consisting of professional clubs in the Republic of Ireland and Derry, Derry City in Northern Ireland. It is governed by the Football Association of Ireland. It was ...

in the

Republic of Ireland Ireland ( ), also known as the Republic of Ireland (), is a country in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe consisting of 26 of the 32 Counties of Ireland, counties of the island of Ireland, with a population of about 5.4 million. ...

and the Irish League in

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 ...

. The cup is sponsored by

Setanta Sports Setanta Sports Media is a sports television company based in Dublin, Ireland and in Tbilisi, Georgia, broadcasting throughout select Eurasian countries, and the Philippines. The company was formed in 1990 to facilitate the broadcasting of Iris ...

; the Irish sports

television network A television broadcaster or television network is a telecommunications network for the distribution of television show, television content, where a central operation provides programming to many television stations, pay television providers or ...

. The competition was launched with Setanta providing support for prize money (

€ The euro sign () is the currency sign used for the euro, the official currency of the eurozone. The design was presented to the public by the European Commission on 12 December 1996. It consists of a stylized letter E (or epsilon), crossed by t ...

350,000) and sponsorship (€1.6 million over 4 years). For this season the cup was simply known as the Setanta Cup before being renamed the Setanta Sports Cup from 2006 onwards.

Glentoran Glentoran Football Club is a professional football club based in East Belfast, Northern Ireland, that plays in the NIFL Premiership. The club was founded in 1882 and has since won more than 130 major honours. They are one of three Northern Iris ...

beat

Longford Town Longford () is the county town of County Longford in Ireland. It had a population of 10,952 at the 2022 census. It is the biggest town in the county and about one third of the county's population lives there. Longford lies at the meeting of I ...

2–1 in the first ever game of the competition on 15 March 2005. The first final saw

Belfast Belfast (, , , ; from ) is the capital city and principal port of Northern Ireland, standing on the banks of the River Lagan and connected to the open sea through Belfast Lough and the North Channel (Great Britain and Ireland), North Channel ...

side Linfield defeat

Dublin Dublin is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. Situated on Dublin Bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, and is bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, pa ...

's Shelbourne 2–0 at

Tolka Park Tolka Park () is an Ireland, Irish association football ground located in the Northside Dublin, north Dublin suburb of Drumcondra, Dublin, Drumcondra, on the northern banks of the River Tolka. It is currently the home ground of League of Irelan ...

in Dublin on 21 May 2005 to collect the winner's prize of

150,000.

Format

The teams would be split into two groups of 3 teams and play each other twice, once at home and once away. The winners of each group would play in a single game final, to be held in Tolka Park if at least one team from the Republic of Ireland was involved. If the final was played between two teams from Northern Ireland, the final would be held at

Windsor Park The National Football Stadium at Windsor Park (officially the Clearer Twist National Stadium at Windsor Park for sponsorship reasons), or the National Football Stadium, also known as Windsor Park is a association football, football stadium in B ...

Qualification

League of Ireland

Shelbourne qualified by winning the 2004 League of Ireland Premier Division title. Longford Town qualified by winning the 2004 FAI Cup Final.

Cork City Cork ( ; from , meaning 'marsh') is the second-largest city in Republic of Ireland, Ireland, the county town of County Cork, the largest city in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Munster and the List of settlements on the island of Ireland ...

took the third spot by finishing second in the 2004 League of Ireland Premier Division.

Irish League

Linfield qualified by winning the 2003–04 Irish Premier League. Glentoran qualified by winning the 2003–04

Irish Cup The Irish Football Association Challenge Cup, commonly referred to as the Irish Cup (currently known as the Clearer Water Irish Cup for sponsorship purposes) is the primary Association football, football single elimination, knockout cup compet ...

. The third spot went to

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 ...

for finishing second in the 2003–04 Irish Premier League. Following a draw (in which league winners were kept apart), the teams were placed as follows; *Group 1; Linfield, Longford Town, Glentoran *Group 2; Shelbourne, Portadown, Cork City

Group stage

Group 1

---- ---- ---- ---- ----

Group 2

---- ---- ---- ---- ----

Final

Goalscorers

;3 goals * Gary Hamilton (Portadown) ;2 goals * Richie Baker (Shelbourne) * Jason Byrne (Shelbourne) *

Glenn Ferguson Glenn Ferguson (born 10 July 1969) is a Northern Irish former football player and manager. Ferguson amassed over 1,000 domestic appearances in a career where he played for Ards, Glenavon, Linfield and Lisburn Distillery, and scored a tot ...

(Linfield) *

Michael Halliday Michael Alexander Kirkwood Halliday (often M. A. K. Halliday; 13 April 1925 – 15 April 2018) was a British linguist who developed the internationally influential systemic functional linguistics (SFL) model of language. His grammatical descri ...

(Glentoran) * Paul McAreavey (Linfield) * Stephen Paisley (Longford Town) * Peter Thompson (Linfield) ;1 goal * Denis Behan (Cork City) *

Wesley Boyle Wesley Boyle (born 30 March 1979) from Northern Ireland is a Association football, football midfielder, who currently works as a coach, having last played for Loughgall F.C. Boyle started his career as an apprentice with Leeds United F.C., Leeds ...

(Portadown) * Kevin Doyle (Cork City) * Jamie Harris (Shelbourne) * Shaun Holmes (Glentoran) * Paul Keegan (Longford Town) * Darren Kelly (Portadown) * Stuart King (Linfield) * Davy Larmour (Linfield) *

Darren Lockhart Darren Lockhart (born 12 November 1973) is a Northern Irish football manager and former player. Playing career Born in Belfast, Lockhart began his professional career with Crusaders after playing at semi-professional level with H&W Welders and ...

(Glentoran) * Gavin Melaugh (Glentoran) * Tim Mouncey (Linfield) * William Murphy (Linfield) * Andy Myler (Longford Town) * Stephen Parkhouse (Glentoran) ;1 own goal * Philip Simpson (Glentoran)

References

External links

Official Setanta Cup Site
{{DEFAULTSORT:2005 Setanta Sports Cup

2005 2005 was designated as the International Year for Sport and Physical Education and the International Year of Microcredit. The beginning of 2005 also marked the end of the International Decade of the World's Indigenous Peoples, Internationa ...

1 2004–05 in Northern Ireland association football