Northampton drew their lowest ever crowd of 762 for their game against West Ham's development squad
Stoke doing their bit for promoting up and coming youth players included Bojan, Imbula and Peter Crouch in their side but still only attracted 689 for their game against Bury.
Elsewhere, 308 saw Middlesbrough's development side lose 3-0 at home to Shrewsbury, while 393 watched Barnet's match against Peterborough.
Portsmouth's lowest post-war crowd of 1,200 saw them beat Bristol Rovers 1-0 and keep alive their chances of making it past the group stages.
And there were just 284 people watching West Brom's academy side play at home to Gillingham - a number, according to the Gills' Twitter account, that included scouts and press, as well as "approximately" nine away fans.
The competition that keeps on giving.
I thought the group stage was supposed to be "regionalised". How did Gillingham and West Brom end up in the same group?
AFC Wimbledon got lumbered in a group with Plymouth, Swansea and Newport, that's far worse.
They should've regionalised it further, north west, north east, midlands, london, south coast, south west etc then at least a few derby games might've given the competition a bit of a boost. As it happens it's a shambles.
Agreed. I did think the Shrewsbury/Middlesbrough link up was a little odd.
Northampton drew their lowest ever crowd of 762 for their game against West Ham's development squad
Stoke doing their bit for promoting up and coming youth players included Bojan, Imbula and Peter Crouch in their side but still only attracted 689 for their game against Bury.
Elsewhere, 308 saw Middlesbrough's development side lose 3-0 at home to Shrewsbury, while 393 watched Barnet's match against Peterborough.
Portsmouth's lowest post-war crowd of 1,200 saw them beat Bristol Rovers 1-0 and keep alive their chances of making it past the group stages.
And there were just 284 people watching West Brom's academy side play at home to Gillingham - a number, according to the Gills' Twitter account, that included scouts and press, as well as "approximately" nine away fans.
The competition that keeps on giving.
I thought the group stage was supposed to be "regionalised". How did Gillingham and West Brom end up in the same group?
AFC Wimbledon got lumbered in a group with Plymouth, Swansea and Newport, that's far worse.
They should've regionalised it further, north west, north east, midlands, london, south coast, south west etc then at least a few derby games might've given the competition a bit of a boost. As it happens it's a shambles.
The problem was (and quite rightly) they needed to make it fair across the board and by doing that they had to give each Group one side from the Academies, one side from League One and one side from League Two.
If they regionalised it like you say with Charlton being the only London team (I know they're not) with the other London sides in League Two (I know thats not the case), then we'd have an unfair advantage on the rest of the teams in the competition.
true but i think if you put it to a vote, then most clubs would prefer it to be further regionalised at the risk of some clubs perhaps having an advantage.
true but i think if you put it to a vote, then most clubs would prefer it to be further regionalised at the risk of some clubs perhaps having an advantage.
The best idea would be just to scrap Groups all together, have
- 48-League One / League Two clubs - 8 clubs from the Academies - 8 clubs from the Conference
Draw a line through the UK, the 32 most Northern sides go into one half of the draw until the Semi-Finals, the 32 most Southern teams go into the other half of the draw until the Semi-Finals in which case the two come together.
If your somewhere like Stoke (i.e. middle of the country) then you run the risk of being in the North or South half of the draw but thats just bad Geographically luck and there is nothing that can be done about it
true but i think if you put it to a vote, then most clubs would prefer it to be further regionalised at the risk of some clubs perhaps having an advantage.
The best idea would be just to scrap Groups all together, have
- 48-League One / League Two clubs - 8 clubs from the Academies - 8 clubs from the Conference
Draw a line through the UK, the 32 most Northern sides go into one half of the draw until the Semi-Finals, the 32 most Southern teams go into the other half of the draw until the Semi-Finals in which case the two come together.
If your somewhere like Stoke (i.e. middle of the country) then you run the risk of being in the North or South half of the draw but thats just bad Geographically luck and there is nothing that can be done about it
I would imagine most residents of Stoke are already aware of their bad luck.
Put all names in one hat, have 2 bowls with 20 balls each, 3 with 0 on them, 6 with 1, 4 with 2, 3 with 3, 2 with 4, 1 with 5 and 1 with 6. Draw 2 names, this is the tie. Draw a number ball from each bowl, this is the score. Keep doing it until you have drawn the entire competition and email it around to all the clubs. You can even livestream so nutters can still claim they haven't missed a game. Done
Northampton drew their lowest ever crowd of 762 for their game against West Ham's development squad
Stoke doing their bit for promoting up and coming youth players included Bojan, Imbula and Peter Crouch in their side but still only attracted 689 for their game against Bury.
Elsewhere, 308 saw Middlesbrough's development side lose 3-0 at home to Shrewsbury, while 393 watched Barnet's match against Peterborough.
Portsmouth's lowest post-war crowd of 1,200 saw them beat Bristol Rovers 1-0 and keep alive their chances of making it past the group stages.
And there were just 284 people watching West Brom's academy side play at home to Gillingham - a number, according to the Gills' Twitter account, that included scouts and press, as well as "approximately" nine away fans.
The competition that keeps on giving.
How can they 'approximate' 9 away fans. How many fingers does the person counting them have missing ?
The only good thing to come out of the draw for the next round is that of the 8 U21 sides who went through, 6 have been drawn to play each other. The more that exit the competition the better so at least there's a chance of the final being between 2 actual league one or two clubs.
The only good thing to come out of the draw for the next round is that of the 8 U21 sides who went through, 6 have been drawn to play each other. The more that exit the competition the better so at least there's a chance of the final being between 2 actual league one or two clubs.
Yeah because that wasnt done deliberately was it...
The only good thing to come out of the draw for the next round is that of the 8 U21 sides who went through, 6 have been drawn to play each other. The more that exit the competition the better so at least there's a chance of the final being between 2 actual league one or two clubs.
It may be better to have 2 U23's play each other at Wembley in front of 2,000. Final nail in coffin.
Have to admit its interesting how the Premier League wet themselves over how good Chelsea and their Youth Teams are yet their only win in this competition was thanks to a penalty shoot-out after a 1-1 draw with Oxford.
Against Swindon and Exeter they lost... If the competition shows one thing it shows how bad a big clubs academy really is!!
I see that young up and coming prospect Peter Crouch started for Stoke last night.
Good to see the youth given a chance
edit - just seen this posted earlier - sorry
But it's ok for Charlton to play Tex? Sorry people need to get over this now, Charlton are out and they have royally messed this up. The main point is Charlton were crap in a tournament that they should have either taken seriously in the sense play the first team. Or copy the U21 sides invited. For example no one has mentioned Slades bizarre decision to leave Lapslie on the bench in a game that would have been perfect for him to try his luck. A lot of the points around the format are 100% valid but I can't help thinking if we had taken this seriously opinions would not be so negative.
The best idea would be to scrap the competition completely.
Why? Because are out? - because Charlton are better than this ?
No because it's a shit competition. A shit format. The f.a. have completely fucked it up with the under 21's from the premier league. It would have been better to allow teams from the National league to compete instead. Just about everything that the f a Could have got wrong they have
The best idea would be to scrap the competition completely.
Why? Because are out? - because Charlton are better than this ?
No because it's a shit competition. A shit format. The f.a. have completely fucked it up with the under 21's from the premier league. It would have been better to allow teams from the National league to compete instead. Just about everything that the f a Could have got wrong they have
So why is everyone whining on here about it? For such a no mark competition there seems to be a lot of contradictory opinion. If you don't like it, simple don't support it and move on. This has been droning on all week and equally after the previous fixtures. This constant bullshit obsession about attendance - who gives a shit how many turned up at Accrington Stanley. Equally I could not give a shit who enters it - I just want to see people take it seriously instead of all this 'I'm premier league I can rest players' nonsense. That's the reality, too many clubs think they are above this and yet from what I'm watching should be thankful they have an opportunity to get to Wembley. As i said if the club had done it right we would all be creaming or pants about going Wembley or better the youth in the club would have been given more opportunity to shine. Instead we do neither and as such it's over. Mid table mediocrity is now what everyone has to look forward to.
I see that young up and coming prospect Peter Crouch started for Stoke last night.
Good to see the youth given a chance
edit - just seen this posted earlier - sorry
But it's ok for Charlton to play Tex? Sorry people need to get over this now, Charlton are out and they have royally messed this up. The main point is Charlton were crap in a tournament that they should have either taken seriously in the sense play the first team. Or copy the U21 sides invited. For example no one has mentioned Slades bizarre decision to leave Lapslie on the bench in a game that would have been perfect for him to try his luck. A lot of the points around the format are 100% valid but I can't help thinking if we had taken this seriously opinions would not be so negative.
We have to play a certain amount of first team players, whereas Stoke are entering an under 23 side. I think you should look further into this competition to understand why the majority have the opinion they do about it.
Northampton drew their lowest ever crowd of 762 for their game against West Ham's development squad
Stoke doing their bit for promoting up and coming youth players included Bojan, Imbula and Peter Crouch in their side but still only attracted 689 for their game against Bury.
Elsewhere, 308 saw Middlesbrough's development side lose 3-0 at home to Shrewsbury, while 393 watched Barnet's match against Peterborough.
Portsmouth's lowest post-war crowd of 1,200 saw them beat Bristol Rovers 1-0 and keep alive their chances of making it past the group stages.
And there were just 284 people watching West Brom's academy side play at home to Gillingham - a number, according to the Gills' Twitter account, that included scouts and press, as well as "approximately" nine away fans.
The competition that keeps on giving.
I thought the group stage was supposed to be "regionalised". How did Gillingham and West Brom end up in the same group?
AFC Wimbledon got lumbered in a group with Plymouth, Swansea and Newport, that's far worse.
They should've regionalised it further, north west, north east, midlands, london, south coast, south west etc then at least a few derby games might've given the competition a bit of a boost. As it happens it's a shambles.
Sod that, more chance your rivals who happen to be in a higher division than you (let's say Palace), have their U23 team playing against the less prosperous lower division team (let's say Charlton). Would rather a 1,000 mile round trip than that ever happening. There is no good outcome.
I see that young up and coming prospect Peter Crouch started for Stoke last night.
Good to see the youth given a chance
edit - just seen this posted earlier - sorry
But it's ok for Charlton to play Tex? Sorry people need to get over this now, Charlton are out and they have royally messed this up. The main point is Charlton were crap in a tournament that they should have either taken seriously in the sense play the first team. Or copy the U21 sides invited. For example no one has mentioned Slades bizarre decision to leave Lapslie on the bench in a game that would have been perfect for him to try his luck. A lot of the points around the format are 100% valid but I can't help thinking if we had taken this seriously opinions would not be so negative.
The whole point of Premier League sides entering their U23's is to bring through young English talent - which isn't happening. Charlton have to play in the competition because of our league position, and we have to play a certain amount of first-teamers - it's not designed for our youth team.
I see that young up and coming prospect Peter Crouch started for Stoke last night.
Good to see the youth given a chance
edit - just seen this posted earlier - sorry
But it's ok for Charlton to play Tex? Sorry people need to get over this now, Charlton are out and they have royally messed this up. The main point is Charlton were crap in a tournament that they should have either taken seriously in the sense play the first team. Or copy the U21 sides invited. For example no one has mentioned Slades bizarre decision to leave Lapslie on the bench in a game that would have been perfect for him to try his luck. A lot of the points around the format are 100% valid but I can't help thinking if we had taken this seriously opinions would not be so negative.
We have to play a certain amount of first team players, whereas Stoke are entering an under 23 side. I think you should look further into this competition to understand why the majority have the opinion they do about it.
I'm more than aware what the competition is. Luton I believe made 10 changes to their line up. So why didn't Charlton? Instead we played a player on loan in the middle who is quite frankly average at best. When sitting on the bench are home grown players who need a chance in the first team. This is what this should be about if you don't want to play your strongest side.
I have posted on here about premier league sides academies and the fact is if you think it's meant to be about developing premier leagues English youth your even more deluded. If that was the case why are the likes of Arsenal signing players from Poland at youth level? Do we not have players of similar elk in the UK? That's the biggest issue, not the competition. Maybe the league need to insist for the u23 sides it's UK registered players only!? Ask a player at any of the lower leagues and they would bite your hand off to play at Wembley. It's the deluded fans that are the snobs.
I see that young up and coming prospect Peter Crouch started for Stoke last night.
Good to see the youth given a chance
edit - just seen this posted earlier - sorry
But it's ok for Charlton to play Tex? Sorry people need to get over this now, Charlton are out and they have royally messed this up. The main point is Charlton were crap in a tournament that they should have either taken seriously in the sense play the first team. Or copy the U21 sides invited. For example no one has mentioned Slades bizarre decision to leave Lapslie on the bench in a game that would have been perfect for him to try his luck. A lot of the points around the format are 100% valid but I can't help thinking if we had taken this seriously opinions would not be so negative.
We have to play a certain amount of first team players, whereas Stoke are entering an under 23 side. I think you should look further into this competition to understand why the majority have the opinion they do about it.
I'm more than aware what the competition is. Luton I believe made 10 changes to their line up. So why didn't Charlton? Instead we played a player on loan in the middle who is quite frankly average at best. When sitting on the bench are home grown players who need a chance in the first team. This is what this should be about if you don't want to play your strongest side.
I have posted on here about premier league sides academies and the fact is if you think it's meant to be about developing premier leagues English youth your even more deluded. If that was the case why are the likes of Arsenal signing players from Poland at youth level? Do we not have players of similar elk in the UK? That's the biggest issue, not the competition. Maybe the league need to insist for the u23 sides it's UK registered players only!? Ask a player at any of the lower leagues and they would bite your hand off to play at Wembley. It's the deluded fans that are the snobs.
I take it you mean Freddie Ulvestad... He's one of our top five players!!
I see that young up and coming prospect Peter Crouch started for Stoke last night.
Good to see the youth given a chance
edit - just seen this posted earlier - sorry
But it's ok for Charlton to play Tex? Sorry people need to get over this now, Charlton are out and they have royally messed this up. The main point is Charlton were crap in a tournament that they should have either taken seriously in the sense play the first team. Or copy the U21 sides invited. For example no one has mentioned Slades bizarre decision to leave Lapslie on the bench in a game that would have been perfect for him to try his luck. A lot of the points around the format are 100% valid but I can't help thinking if we had taken this seriously opinions would not be so negative.
We have to play a certain amount of first team players, whereas Stoke are entering an under 23 side. I think you should look further into this competition to understand why the majority have the opinion they do about it.
I'm more than aware what the competition is. Luton I believe made 10 changes to their line up. So why didn't Charlton? Instead we played a player on loan in the middle who is quite frankly average at best. When sitting on the bench are home grown players who need a chance in the first team. This is what this should be about if you don't want to play your strongest side.
I have posted on here about premier league sides academies and the fact is if you think it's meant to be about developing premier leagues English youth your even more deluded. If that was the case why are the likes of Arsenal signing players from Poland at youth level? Do we not have players of similar elk in the UK? That's the biggest issue, not the competition. Maybe the league need to insist for the u23 sides it's UK registered players only!? Ask a player at any of the lower leagues and they would bite your hand off to play at Wembley. It's the deluded fans that are the snobs.
I take it you mean Freddie Ulvestad... He's one of our top five players!!
Comments
If they regionalised it like you say with Charlton being the only London team (I know they're not) with the other London sides in League Two (I know thats not the case), then we'd have an unfair advantage on the rest of the teams in the competition.
- 48-League One / League Two clubs
- 8 clubs from the Academies
- 8 clubs from the Conference
Draw a line through the UK, the 32 most Northern sides go into one half of the draw until the Semi-Finals, the 32 most Southern teams go into the other half of the draw until the Semi-Finals in which case the two come together.
If your somewhere like Stoke (i.e. middle of the country) then you run the risk of being in the North or South half of the draw but thats just bad Geographically luck and there is nothing that can be done about it
Swansea City Under-21s face a 626-mile round trip to face Norwich City U21s in the last 32 of the Checkatrade Trophy.
Cambridge United have a 320-mile round trip to Bradford City in the Northern Section of the competition.
Against Swindon and Exeter they lost... If the competition shows one thing it shows how bad a big clubs academy really is!!
Sorry people need to get over this now, Charlton are out and they have royally messed this up. The main point is Charlton were crap in a tournament that they should have either taken seriously in the sense play the first team. Or copy the U21 sides invited. For example no one has mentioned Slades bizarre decision to leave Lapslie on the bench in a game that would have been perfect for him to try his luck. A lot of the points around the format are 100% valid but I can't help thinking if we had taken this seriously opinions would not be so negative.
A shit format.
The f.a. have completely fucked it up with the under 21's from the premier league.
It would have been better to allow teams from the National league to compete instead.
Just about everything that the f a
Could have got wrong they have
So why is everyone whining on here about it? For such a no mark competition there seems to be a lot of contradictory opinion. If you don't like it, simple don't support it and move on. This has been droning on all week and equally after the previous fixtures. This constant bullshit obsession about attendance - who gives a shit how many turned up at Accrington Stanley.
Equally I could not give a shit who enters it - I just want to see people take it seriously instead of all this 'I'm premier league I can rest players' nonsense. That's the reality, too many clubs think they are above this and yet from what I'm watching should be thankful they have an opportunity to get to Wembley.
As i said if the club had done it right we would all be creaming or pants about going Wembley or better the youth in the club would have been given more opportunity to shine. Instead we do neither and as such it's over. Mid table mediocrity is now what everyone has to look forward to.
Charlton have to play in the competition because of our league position, and we have to play a certain amount of first-teamers - it's not designed for our youth team.
That's why those distinctions are being made.
But until they sell the club we might have to get used to it
I have posted on here about premier league sides academies and the fact is if you think it's meant to be about developing premier leagues English youth your even more deluded. If that was the case why are the likes of Arsenal signing players from Poland at youth level? Do we not have players of similar elk in the UK? That's the biggest issue, not the competition. Maybe the league need to insist for the u23 sides it's UK registered players only!?
Ask a player at any of the lower leagues and they would bite your hand off to play at Wembley. It's the deluded fans that are the snobs.