Dartford game

Another 1-0 3 pts game. 50 pts from 30 games. We would have taken that at the season start. How was the new guy?

Apparently the new guy lives a few minutes from Dartford's ground. Their supporters were gutted to lose him.
He looked good in the first half, but our Big-House keeper made loads of match-saving stops today.

As usual Dartford are a big strong team and it was very hard work for our lads but we played a lot of football and our keeper kept another clean sheet. Should have been MOM we thought although Chinn had a bright debut.
Best bits for me was when Alabi came on and played the defenders at their own game. They couldn't push him around. Just brushed them off.
And the time when Clark had four defenders closing him down near the corner flag. He turned and sent every one of them the wrong way. Brilliant.

I agree, Big-House should have been our MOM

should have been at least 3 - 0 up before half time. thought we were going to pay for missed chances but held on for another clean sheet. richard chin was exciting. seams to be another class young winger in the squad. love big james coming on for last 20. great character and a power house. quite a few fans moaned when rex mannings got released but seams that was the correct call from gill. JT ewan clark and now richard hand seam so talented and exciting. Veteran Elliot frear is class back up to the youngsters. 2/3rds of the season gone and on the home straight. i hope we lose tuesday to wsm. can we put out a youth team or do rules state you need first teamers too play. i'm gutted i miss st albans game as that's 2 teams on fire at the moment. still very tight the top 9. torquay look to be fading, how does johnson keep his job. all in all another great day watching the stripes. take these 1 - 0 all day long. we seam to have played better and lost many times this season. Yeovil home and away immediately spring to mind. any way. good stuff city boys. looking forward too the final stretch. Drink up ye cider.

No doubt the county fa rule that the strongest team should be fielded but just ignore it and rest key players. It’s high time this competition was revamped so that clubs are not hindered with playing its games in the middle of winter.

Whilst I am a bit of a traditionalist, I think this competition belongs in the horse and cart era. At best it should be changed to allow more fringe/academy/youth players a run out.
There is certainly no room for it in the current madness of a 24 club league.

24 are too many teams in NLN & NLS!!!

I remember in the 90s. We had gm Vauxhall conference. Fa cup.endless Replays with out penalty shoot outs. Fa trophy. Somerset cup. Welsh cup. Flood light cup. West Gate insurance cup. So we're a bit less congested but still seams compact with 46 league games.

National league Premier clubs get straight into 4th qualifying round of fa cup and a later fa trophy round. So in theory should play less games than north/south leagues.

Very good point. You and I have constantly argued that the bulk of this competition should be played pre-season but realistically that’s not going to happen. However an obvious improvement would be to provide byes in the first round for the highest level clubs. Seems crazy that some of the NLS clubs had to play in the first round while the Western League teams didn’t.

Make the SPC a one day, summer knockout tournament with 30 minute games. Legends teams only. Could run at the Bath & West show in early June with music / beer tents and a festival atmosphere. Showcase all the local football clubs to a new audience with youth, walking football and disability teams / Foundations all getting involved in the day.

comrade powell wrote:Very good point. You and I have constantly argued that the bulk of this competition should be played pre-season but realistically that’s not going to happen. However an obvious improvement would be to provide byes in the first round for the highest level clubs. Seems crazy that some of the NLS clubs had to play in the first round while the Western League teams didn’t.

We got a bye into the 2nd round this year for winning it, so the answer is just to win it every year like we (almost) used to!

Yes but if you win it that means you have to play more of the damned games!