Soccer APIs – FA Cup & Trophy Competition Consolidation

We're consolidating the qualification and main-draw rounds of the FA Cup and FA Trophy into single competitions in our Soccer and Soccer Extended APIs.

Currently, the qualification rounds and main competition for these two events are maintained as separate competitions. Beginning with the new season, the standalone qualification competitions will be retired, and all qualification and main-draw content will be delivered through a single competition for each event:

Retired Competition	Content now delivered through
`1696` – FA Cup, Qualification	`19` – FA Cup
`1991` – FA Trophy, Qualification	`628` – FA Trophy

You can confirm these competition IDs through the Competitions endpoint (shown below). Competitions 1696 and 1991 will be retired, with all qualification content delivered through 19 and 628 respectively.

This change applies only to the FA Cup and FA Trophy. Other qualification tournaments that exist as independent competitions — such as the FIFA World Cup qualifiers and UEFA European Championship qualifiers — are structured differently and are not affected.

⭐ Benefit

Access both qualification and main-draw content for the FA Cup and FA Trophy through a single competition ID each, rather than tracking separate competitions for qualification and main rounds.

📋 Recommended Actions

Update any integration that references competitions 1696 (FA Cup, Qualification) or 1991 (FA Trophy, Qualification), as these will be retired.
Retrieve qualification and main-draw content for the FA Cup and FA Trophy from competitions 19 and 628 respectively.
Confirm this change is in place before the new season begins on 23 August.

🔢 Products

Sport	Product	Version(s)
Soccer	Soccer API	v4
Soccer	Soccer Extended API	v4

🔁 Competitions Affected

19 – FA Cup
628 – FA Trophy
1696 – FA Cup, Qualification (retired)
1991 – FA Trophy, Qualification (retired)

☑️ Sample Request:

Retrieve these competitions through the Competitions endpoint:

curl --request GET \
     --url https://api.sportradar.com/soccer/trial/v4/en/competitions.json \
     --header 'accept: application/json' \
     --header 'x-api-key: YOUR_API_KEY'

⚙️ Return Samples

The following shows the four competitions as they currently exist. After the change, 1696 and 1991 will no longer be returned.

<competition id="sr:competition:19" name="FA Cup" gender="men">
    <category id="sr:category:1" name="England" country_code="ENG"/>
</competition>

<competition id="sr:competition:628" name="FA Trophy" gender="men">
    <category id="sr:category:252" name="England Amateur" country_code="ENG"/>
</competition>

<competition id="sr:competition:1696" name="FA Cup, Qualification" gender="men">
    <category id="sr:category:1" name="England" country_code="ENG"/>
</competition>

<competition id="sr:competition:1991" name="FA Trophy, Qualification" gender="men">
    <category id="sr:category:252" name="England Amateur" country_code="ENG"/>
</competition>