Thursday 6 April 2017 18:59, UK
EFL chief executive Shaun Harvey thinks there is a positive future for the Checkatrade Trophy after a "rocky start" in its new format.
The competition came in for criticism after it was revamped for the 2016/17 season.
Among the changes introduced were League One and League Two sides having to field teams featuring at least five players who started the previous or following game, leading to fines for several clubs.
Academies from Premier League and Championship clubs were also invited to compete.
"The competition had a rocky start, there's no denying that," Harvey told Sky Sports. "Some of that was because we tried to bring it in very quickly at the start of the year.
"The opportunity presented itself and rather than just be stood still we thought let's see if we can reinvigorate a competition that was generally struggling.
"Everything got merged into one and we lost the clarity around the objectives we had, which were to increase financial returns for clubs and give young players the chance to play in men's football."
Coventry were crowned champions of the competition after beating Oxford United 2-1 at Wembley in a final watched by around 70,000 fans.
That attendance aside, otherwise crowds were largely sparse, especially in the group stages.
Harvey hopes that could be improved by enticing the likes of Arsenal, Liverpool, Manchester City, Manchester United and Tottenham to enter the competition.
"We suffered from the bigger clubs in the Premier League not entering and I thought that was unfortunate," he said.
"The big problem was not that they did not want to compete, but the fixture schedule is such that the only time we could get the group game is in international week and a lot of the younger players they would want to see benefit are on international duty.
"The fixture calendar doesn't help create the opportunities, but we did it with Chelsea where we were able to move their games away from the international week. That got Chelsea involved and that was important.
"We will discuss with the clubs a pair of dates to try to do that. We are going to try to remove as many reasons and excuses for clubs not to want to compete."
Harvey also said the need for League One and League Two clubs to field a certain number of "first-team" players will be discussed at an upcoming meeting.
"That's one of the key areas we need to address," he commented. "If we can find the right solution for the EFL clubs I think there is a future going forward.
"We do need everybody to get behind what we are trying to achieve. It's easy to say it didn't work so let's do something differently, but let's have a good hard look at what we need to change. I think as part of a solution this competition has a big part to play."
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