Saturday Games

[Formic]

Now the UCL has just published the complete list of Saturday fixtures for the season, I ran a quick query to see which teams had been lucky with an increased number of home league games on a Saturday (I didn't include the 3pm kickoffs on New Years Day or Easter Monday).

Assuming the query is correct, here are the totals of home and away league games on Saturdays for each club.

Team Home Away
AFC Rushden & Diamonds 8 16
Bourne Town 16 15
Buckingham Town 16 11
Bugbrooke St Michaels 11 11
Burton Park Wanderers 14 12
Eynesbury Rovers 13 14
Harrowby United 14 15
Northampton ON Chenecks 15 12
Northampton Sileby Rangers 13 14
Northampton Spencer 10 14
Oadby Town 12 12
Olney Town 14 12
Potton United 14 12
Raunds Town 15 14
Rothwell Corinthians 13 11
Rushden & Higham United 12 13
Thrapston Town 10 13
Wellingborough Whitworth 14 13
Wootton Blue Cross 13 13

Thrapston's home total is lower due to their cricket commitments, and Northampton Spencer have had a lot of problems at their ground, but one might have thought we might have seen some more emphasis on arranging more home games for us on Saturdays when they sorted the fixtures through to May given we are 4-5 games behind the average number of Saturday home games.

I'd assumed the reason the UCL was one of the few leagues that doesn't publish a fixture list for the whole season "in advance" was to allow any "smoothing out" necessary due to early season cup games, but it doesn't look too smooth when you consider this list, even allowing for ground sharing / FA Competitions etc in a 37 Saturday season.

[Rushdenjim]

Interesting but not surprising

[sussexdiamond]

Very clearly a case of lets give the saturdays to other clubs so that they all enjoy the benefits of a large crowd. Sod AFC Rushden and Diamonds.

i wonder if it will be any better next season? I would n't bet on it!!

[Bob's Bitch]

Looks like a fix looking at that. This season is like being slowly tortured, it's taking ages! I'm getting bored of it to be honest. I was expecting the season to finish on April 1st, not May 4th!

[Sid]

The season always finishes in early May doesn't it?

[Bob's Bitch]

The Conference is finishing on April 20th (enforced I know but they seem to be coping well enough). A 36-game season doesn't need to take this long.

[Sid]

Fair enough, it may well be possible but almost universally at this level the season is scheduled to run into May, I imagine most clubs, players, fans prefer it that way, I do.

[TheIncognitoKid]

The Conference is finishing on April 20th (enforced I know but they seem to be coping well enough). A 36-game season doesn't need to take this long.

But the conference teams don't have to compete in 78 different cup competions! ;)

[davealbon]

The Conference is finishing on April 20th (enforced I know but they seem to be coping well enough). A 36-game season doesn't need to take this long.

But the conference teams don't have to compete in 78 different cup competions! ;)

They usually compete in one more than we have this season! We've had the Vase, UCL KO Cup and NFA Junior Cup. Conference teams have the FA Cup, Trophy, Senior County Cup, and most seasons the Conference League Cup (aka Setanta Shield). The difference is, they are allowed to play the 'lower profile' competitions on midweek evenings, and not Saturday afternoons as we've had to.

[Redsnapper]

To add a little more spice to Formic's OP.

After the league fixtures have settled down a bit I've noticed our first midweek away league game (not on a Saturday) is Sileby on Tues 26th Feb.

The only other midweek away game scheduled this season appears to be Whitworths (next door) and that's on Easter Bank Holiday Monday, so hardly midweek.

I'll let you make you're own minds as to the ethics behind this ......... ;)