But a domestic cup can be the corner stone of a good team. Winning a cup is a good way to get over that final roadblock to become a winning team. A taste of what it is like to win that can spur the players on to bigger things.
Have to disagree completly.
The ONLY teams to have won a Domestic trophy since the PL began other than the "big 6" have been:
Leicester (both PL & FA Cup)
Blackburn (PL) = relegated
Everton (FA Cup) = about to be relegated
Portsmouth (FA Cup) = relegated
Wigan (FA Cup) = relegated
these are the ONLY exceptions.
Woolwich, Chelsea, Liverpool, Man C or Man U will have won 28/30 PL titles and 26/30 FA Cups.
By the end of this 30th Premier League season, the 90 major domestic trophies of the era (PL, FAC, LC) will have been won 82% of the time, or 74/90, by just the "big six": MUFC (22), CFC (16 or 17), AFC (13), MCFC (13 or 14), LFC (8-10) and Leicester (4). Shoehorn in Spurs for the Legaue Cup in 2008 (1).
It didn't spur us on in 2008, it didn't Spur Leicester on, Blackburn, Everton, Portsmouth or Wigan.
This narrative I think was created by Mourinho, when he won the Legaue Cup (his 1st Trophy for Chavs), ever since then it's stuck with whoever "X" Team is going for a Trophy, it's even trotted out by some of the "big 6" who may not have won one in a while eg Woolwich in FA Cup, Man U when Mourinho was managing, his jammy win in the Europa League was supposed to be the catalyst of their new era.
For us, being part of the "big 6" on a regular basis improves our chances of winning a trophy. On the scale of things we've not long been in this group over the last 30yrs (I'd say this really should be when you're in the top 4 when you know you have a team good enough to get to the latter stages of most domestic trophy's, it does then require a bit of luck on who you draw, I think we've drawn the best team in every final/semi-Final we've played in bar the Man U FA Cup-semi, unlike Woolwich breaking their duck in FA Cup vs relegated Hull and relegated Villa, same as Man U in Europa Cup beating an U21 team and Southampton in League Cup, City's two FA Cup's under the sportswashers was against Stoke & Watford in the most one-sided Cup Final ever played, 6-0).
TDLR: To win a trophy we need to be good enough as a team to be regularly fighting in the top 6 and get a bit of luck who you draw in the semi-final/final when you get there.