No wins by holders

[Rogin the Armchair fan]

The Players Championship in golf is this weekend, and one of its quirky stats is that in the 50 years it's been held, no-one has won it twice in a row, even though a few have won it more than once. Scottie Scheffler, the 2023 champ, tees off tomorrow as hot favourite but with that curse on his shoulders. Golf may be special in this regard, as there are only a few players who have won any of the majors back-to-back, Padraig Harrington being the most recent in the Open for example in 2008, but I wondered if there are other examples of trophies that have never had, or gone years without, a champion repeating their win?

[Southport Zeb]

The NFC East has gone 19 consecutive seasons since a team won it in consecutive seasons, which seems incredibly unlikely given that there are only four competitors.

[Wouter D]

There's a quarter of a century gap between repeat winners in the European Cup / Champions League.
AC Milan 88/89 and 89/90
Real Madrid 15/16 and 16/17

Spain 08/12 ruined the record for UEFA European championships, which had been running since 1960. So it took 52 years for the first repeat.

[Wouter D]

Unexpectedly, the OFC nations cup has had back-to-back winners exactly as often as the UEFA European Championships: only once (Australia 80/96).

[Simon G]

The FIFA World Cup is up to 60 years without a repeat winner (Brazil in 58 and 62).

The British Open (BDO then WDF - not the PDC UK Open) in darts has never had a repeat winner - it was first held in 1975. Eric Bristow won it on 4 separate occasions with Cliff Lazarenko, John Lowe and Martin Adams all winning it on 2 separate occasions.

[tee rex]

The EFL Trophy (choose your favourite sponsor in line with your club's triumph) has been going over 40 years with no repeats. The holders might not be eligible, of course.

This means there hasn't yet been a real world test of day-trippers' interest in the competition: if 20,000 instant fans go to Wembley, how many would bother to return? (Play-off finals don't really count, because that prize really does matter, nobody calls it a Mickey Mouse promotion).

[tee rex]

And I've made a glaringly obvious mistake there, because teams have indeed returned the following year, but they didn't win it. So stick that idea in the shredder.

[Simon G]

The EFL Trophy (choose your favourite sponsor in line with your club's triumph) has been going over 40 years with no repeats. The holders might not be eligible, of course.

This means there hasn't yet been a real world test of day-trippers' interest in the competition: if 20,000 instant fans go to Wembley, how many would bother to return? (Play-off finals don't really count, because that prize really does matter, nobody calls it a Mickey Mouse promotion).

Cheltenham have played in 4 big finals in our history. Once at the old Wembley, two at the Millennium Stadium and once at the new Wembley. All within 14 years. Our attendances went as follows:

1998 - FA Trophy Final - Wembley - 18,000
2002 - Div 3 Playoff - Millennium - 15,000
2006 - Lge 2 Playoff - Millennium - 12,000
2012 - Lge 2 Playoff - Wembley - 9,000