1939–40 FA Cup
football tournament season
The 1939–40 FA Cup was an abandoned season of the world's oldest football cup competition, the Football Association Challenge Cup, commonly known as the FA Cup. The competition began as the 65th season of the competition, but was abandoned after just the first round of qualifying matches, due to the start of World War II.
Suspension
The 1939–40 FA Cup began on 2 September 1939, the day after Germany had invaded Poland. On 3 September the United Kingdom declared war with Germany and its allies. The FA suspended the FA Cup on 7 September, until further notice; on 21 September it was announced that all organised football was cancelled for the duration of the war, with only friendly and regional competitions permitted. All results to date in the 1939-40 season were declared null and void.
The Football League War Cup began in October 1939. Organised by the Football League, this was the only national-level competition during the war. Alongside this, the Wartime League or regionalised competitions provided regular football for players and fans during the war.
Extra-Preliminary Round
62 ties were scheduled for 2 September 1939. The results of several matches are missing, but it is not known if these were simply not played, or if the results went unrecorded as it quickly became apparent that the competition would not be continued.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “1939–40 FA Cup” is football tournament season. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through football, tournament and season, not as a finished interpretation.
Why this record matters
The phrase “football tournament season” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Apr 30, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q97275004. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1939.
A concise general-reference account can conceal disagreements about scope, terminology or the weight assigned to individual sources. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.
- Subject orientation
- Search vocabulary
- Locating named sources
The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “1939–40 FA Cup”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow 1939–40 FA Cup primary sources, 1939–40 FA Cup archive and football research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “1939–40 FA Cup”?
- Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
- What terminology or title could unlock a more precise catalogue search?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “1939–40 FA Cup” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.