League of Ireland Originally known as the Free State Junior Cup, the competition's first winners were
Brideville who beat
Cobh Ramblers in the inaugural 1923–24 final. Brideville and Cobh Ramblers also became the first of several future
League of Ireland members to feature in an FAI Junior Cup final.
Sligo Rovers,
Evergreen United,
St Patrick's Athletic,
Bray Wanderers,
Home Farm,
Finn Harps and
St Francis all won the cup before joining the national league.
Drogheda United were finalists on four occasions but never winners while
Athlone Town won the cup twice during the 1930s after dropping out of the League of Ireland. In 2000, the competition had 700 teams enter.
Recent finals On 2 June 2013 the FAI Junior Cup final was played at the
Aviva Stadium for the first time. It was played before a friendly international between the
Republic of Ireland and
Georgia. The 2014–15 and 2015–16 finals were both played as double headers along with the
FAI Intermediate Cup finals.
Television coverage TV coverage debuted on
TG4 and
Setanta Sports in 2014 from the quarter-finals stage.
Irish TV replaced TG4 as free-to-air broadcaster in 2015, and all three channels showed coverage in 2016, again from the quarter-finals stage. In a major change, the 2016–17 season saw coverage begin with the third round in October, running on the newly renamed
eir Sport, IrishTV until its closure in March 2017, and TG4 from the quarter-finals stage.
FAI Senior Cup The semi-finalists of the Junior Cup have traditionally been invited to play in the preliminary rounds of the
FAI Senior Cup. In April 2024, this was officially changed to grant the four semi-finalists automatic qualification into the FAI Cup. The number of clubs increased ahead of the
2025 season, with all 8 quarter-finalists from the FAI Junior Cup now eligible. In August 2025, the FAI announced that the Junior Cup would move to a calendar season, in line with the League of Ireland and the FAI Senior Cup. ==List of finals==