Paullow

Kairat-Pafos has come to life. Been mainly Kairat with the man advantage, both have had decent chances in the past 5 mins and now Pafos have just taken the lead against the run of play. OG off the bar and on to the keeper and in. Edit - offside, no goal, still 0-0.

Leicester have been in as well, but I think they dropped down from the Europa, which isn't an option now. Only one English club can enter now.

Pafos down to 10 men after only 3 mins in Kazakhstan in the big one.

Battle of the minnows for me.

Didn't realise they were pairing the local sides up this midweek. Blyth T 1-6 Consett, Dunston 3-0 Blyth S. Heaton vs Newton Aycliffe and Redcar vs Ashington tomorrow. Bishop Auckland being the odd one out, but they got a big 3-1 away win and go from bottom (22nd) to 18th and just outside the relegation zone. Good news for them, but bad news for the 3 Northumberland sides in trouble. Blyth Spartans now bottom of the league. Crazy.

Regarding NPL East, it's hard to gauge without knowing budgets etc. there was a thread on the nonleague forum about budgets just the other day, but a lot of that would be guess work (and troll posts). https://nonleaguezone.proboards.com/thread/1912/budgets We do know that Redcar Ath have a big budget and, hence, are doing well, but in recent years we've seen the likes of Morpeth and Hebburn come through the NPL East quite quickly and move up to the 7th tier, Stockton as well (although that is a lot bigger town than many of the 9 sides in the 8th tier). Dunston are usually in and around the playoffs, Newton Aycliffe have finished 7th and 6th in their two seasons at this level, just missing out on the playoffs last season, but it looks like they have lost a few players this year and were more expected to struggle, but teams can, and in some cases, do make a good fist of things after leaving the Northern League. Plus this year, as well as Blyth Town and Redcard Ath, we've had Lincoln Utd, Silsden and Hallam all promoted from the Northern League 9th tier equivalent, obviously if they had Redcar-esq budgets then that's a different story, but with Brighouse just staying up last year due to a reprieve, you'd like to think there'd be at least 2 or 3 non NL clubs in and around the bottom so that we just lose 1 or 2 teams to relegation, not 3 or 4. I mentioned Kendal on here about a month ago, but since then they won 5 in a row (in the Northern League) before drawing on Saturday, but if they get promoted I assume they will join the NPL West instead, so we could have a net loss of 3 clubs next year if 4 teams did go down and one of the promoted 2 don't join the NPL East league.

2 interesting matches on normal telly tonight at the same time. Northern Ireland vs Germany on BBC2 and Wales vs Belgium on BBC3 (and other channels). If Wolte starts I'll probably watch Germany, if not, then I'll watch Wales.

NPL East makes for grim reading. 9 North East clubs this year, but 5 of them make up the bottom 7 and 3 of them from 20th-22nd. Bishops do have some games in hand, and weren't expected to struggle, but you could easily see 2 or 3 dropping this year.

Ha, I believed you, it was more of the set up I was laughing at. Can't imagine Haltwhistle's being much better, although maybe less sheep. Did you just park on the side of the road near the green? I guess at this level it will be more of a bucket coming round to contribute than an entry fee? I know Prudhoe YC is £6, but that's the league above with floodlights and what not.

Might take in the big Wallington vs Haltwhistle tier 11 clash tomorrow. I kind of live between both grounds so a reasonably local fixture (nearer Haltwhistle). I've often wanted to go up to Wallington as it looks a nice location and nice drive up on the country roads, and Haltwhistle are doing really well this year. They would usually both be at the respective other end of the table. Unfortunately neither team can get promoted into the Northern League, so that is a bit off putting as it does make it a bit more pointless with this being as high up the pyramid as they could go without significant ground investment, but hopefully a well contested match.

Without reading any replies, Bruno, Trippier, Burn.

Equalised in the 98th minute direct from a corner, but the same player should have then won it with the last kick of the game.

That was like a Sunday League player after a heavy session there from Elanga.

I'd be raging if that was Botman or someone at the other end. Should be the game won now, good opportunity to rotate ahead of Sunday.

Aye, it's weird (but good) that you are kind of competing with 35 different clubs in this format (although there will of course be mini competitions within that) instead of just 3 in the old format. This match would usually have no bearing on us, whereas here, a draw possibly would be favourable. 2-1 Atalanta.

I guess it could be similar-ish with Dan Burn, although he was playing regular Championship football from 10 years ago, but their captain is Christian Burgess who is 34 in a week and as of 2020 he had just completed 5 years with Portsmouth in the 4th and 3rd tiers, never beyond League One level and then joined USG as a 28/29 year old in the Belgian 2nd tier. He's started 7 of their 9 matches this season (5 of 7 in the league), and then the Newcastle fan Ross Sykes has started 3 of their league games, he's 26 now and was playing for Accrington in 2022. Obviously just 2 players, and one of them may not start, but you see that and think there should be significant levels between the teams. They've also got lots of Belgium players mid twenties without a cap between them who start most of their games. But then you see Club Brugge destroying Rangers, beating Atalanta in the CL KO's last year, beating Villa in the group stage (before losing both L16 matches to them) and USG finished above Brugge last year to win the league. Obviously a lot of unknown about USG, but I do think playing Club Brugge would feel tougher on paper.

I'd say more the former. A class winger is in his element there, but Rice did do well.

Lack of confidence there.

Hopefully shades of the rare home match we lost against these 3 years ago where we had a penalty overturned and then Murphy hit the post before losing 0-2.

Gordon has started like a competition winner.

One of the worst corners I've ever seen, ha.

'Fletch' proper gutted Fernandes missed.