Provisional Picks 2016-17

SO.

That is how all modern TV guests introduce their statements SO why should I be any different.

I shall look at fixtures and other stuff and seek out websites and make a final decision soon but I have made a provisional selection of teams for this season:

Premier League: Arsenal (my team)

League Championship: Brighton & Hove Albion
I have followed Brentford for a while and they have done a reasonable job with their web information but they fell into a "form" site and I have no loyalty so my allegiance will change to Brighton, as a facebook friend sometimes goes to watch them.

League One: Southend United (old home town)

League Two: Exeter City (home town)

National League: North Ferriby United
I have been following the rise of this team for some time now and I am so impressed that the northern half of a little village in the middle of nowhere can reach such heights. They must have things well organised and local support must be worth the efforts. They have not been part of my pyramid until this season so I will make every effort to watch them if I go near the area.

National League South: Weston-Super_Mare
Having stated that I do get to watch their goals on social media they do deserve that I go and pay my entrance fee to watch them for real some time. Maybe this season will be the one when I make the time to watch the seagulls.

Southern League Premier: Weymouth
I had a look at a few teams here as I have uncles and aunts in several of these places but I chose Weymouth as I have been inside the ground on one occasion. The Speedway takes place (or did) next door and we were told to use the toilets in the football ground. I probably owe them the cost of a pee.

Southern League South & West: Tiverton Town
This one may have to be my main team for the season as it is half an hour to drive to and as I have mentioned there will be the opportunity to see Hereford and Salisbury as well as Bideford and Barnstaple who were on my list last year. I may yet return to watching live football regularly but I do feel this way every summer and then I remember how cold and wet you get in reality.

Western League Premier: Willand Rovers
Probably the weakest of my choices and based purely on proximity assuming that they play at the Willand that I have found on the map. I know nothing about them so it is a completely fresh start.

South West Peninsula League Premier Division: Tiverton Town Reserves
Why not choose the second team of a club I have put on my list as I may find some of the same players moving between teams and that would build a relationship that I have not had for many a year.

That concludes my provisional pyramid pick. Unless I find anything unpleasant out about these clubs they will be followed with interest throughout the season.

Bardon Hill Sports

I love mysteries, which is probably why I started studying the football league pyramid a few years back. During my time trying to work out what is actually going on I have gone from website to website and the one consistent factor that I have picked up on is that if something is on the F.A. Website nobody else is allowed to publish it on their own website.

Now I have always suspected that the F.A. are out of touch with the modern world, if only by their continued appointments as England Manager of those people who were "good a few years ago". We shall see if Sam Allardyce is another in the long line but I have a feeling that he may just be the man we need because I hate him with a passion. He was one of the first to park the bus in front of Arsenal and get a draw as a result. As England are not the perfect team that the press would have you believe we probably need to start with defence and then gradually build an attacking approach.

The F.A. Website clearly uses out of date processes to update its own systems. I have noticed that when teams change their names the F.A. still use the old name for a season and sometimes longer. I will pick up on name changes as I always try to identify which teams are the same as a similarly named team from the previous season and which are entirely new teams. This is not always easy given the dearth of information online. Often it is only the locals that know.

This season I went through the F.A.Cup draw and saw that Leicester Nirvana are still called Thurnby by the F.A. There must be some rule about cup entry if you change your name. Tower Hamlets were on the site as Bethnal Green but I have just checked the site and somebody has now updated that one. Now that I check again the name Thurnby has been changed to Leicester as well. This proves to me that the F.A. are just a bit slow or stupid. Either that or their processes are restrictive.

The mystery for me was when I found out that match number 66 does not exist on the F.A. Website but I feared not as the F.A.Cup draw, although banned by the F.A. from other websites, appears in various places at various times because enough people care about it. I found a good site where the information showed me that match number 66 is Bardon Hill Sports v. Kirby Muxloe. A quick search of my league tables revealed nothing in the top 10 tiers of the game. What was going on? Where were Bardon Sports? I found a website that referred to the Leicestershire Senior League and there I found them, but why are they the only level 11 team in the F.A.Cup? The mystery deepened.

I had to delve into last year's tables to find the Bardon Hill Sports team that entered the F.A.Cup. There was a Bardon Hill Sports that were relegated from the Midland League Premier Division. That must be the team that the F.A. were referring to. I guess they went through the classic departure of team and/or manager and folded. The club will continue in the Leicestershire Senior League and their second team will become their first team. This is a familiar situation that I went through with my first lower league team, Elmore Eagles.

It would be nice if the F.A. would put out a statement to explain this but they do like to keep everything secret. You are only allowed to know stuff if you are in the know. Match number 66 remains missing but it is possible to work out what has happened because in the Preliminary Round Kirby Muxloe are already in place. As the matches have not taken place this can only mean that a walkover has been awarded. Please you F.A. (change to expletives from definition) put a statement on your website to explain the situation.

This is an interesting time of year for me. I need to choose another (or the same) set of teams to follow at every level of the game for the new season about to start.

Arsenal are a given, but I may change any other team for any reason. I do, though, link up to the websites of any team that I have chosen to follow and some teams do a far superior job of keeping me informed than others. Those are the ones I am much more likely to visit and pay my entrance fee. I must recommend the Weston-Super-Mare efforts as I regularly get to see the goals.

My F.A.Cup spreadsheet is now set up for the season. Only one week until the competition starts.

Non-League Newspapers

So we have had a refreshing break from the incessant continuum of football.

You know when Sky Sports started I thought that at last we would be able to watch the matches that we want to instead of being shown a few highlights of all the matches of the world renowned BBC program Match of the Day. Sky then used their control of coverage to influence the date on which matches are played and prevented the ordinary fan from seeing their team some of the time.

We needed a challenger and Virgin did not step up. Thankfully BT Sports has appeared and they have shown me what a good organisation can do in terms of covering National League football and the two F.A. competitions other than the Cup, the Trophy and the Vase. Kudos to BT and I hope that crowds in the lower leagues increase as a result. It has always fascinated me how something is nothing until it appears on television and then it becomes everything.

These days I can watch football seven days a week if I choose to and I have come close but it is the choice that I want. I do not need to watch every match that is available. My dream is to see all matches live streamed so that all fans everywhere can watch their own team live but "SKY" have put a stop to that as they make more money by denying that opportunity to ordinary people. Advertisers will pay big money if they know they have a captive audience of millions.

Enough of power broker bashing. What did I learn this week as I picked up several football newspapers. The mighty Malmesbury Victoria are moving from the Hellenic League to the Western League. That is positive and I do not hear much positivity about the Western League, that organisation that mops up everything on the far lower left of the country. The Football League Trophy will include invited teams with Category One Academies, an interesting innovation.

The F.A.Cup now requires teams participating to have gained 63 points from a 38 game season. I have not seen how that works if your season is more or less that 38 games. I think the competition was probably getting a bit too big and this exercises a measure of control over the number of entrants.

In the F.A.Trophy preliminary round Salisbury have been drawn against Hereford. Good start!

Did you know that 95 laws of the game have changed over the summer. It seems that most of the changes are merely an attempt to clarify things that are already common practice but need to be defined more clearly in the rulebook. There may be one or two problems next season if a keen eyed referee decided to interpret a newly written rule other than the way it was intended. Remember that is what accountants and lawyers do so why not referees?

I think that will do for now. I must get back to catching up on Game of Thrones.