Chuck a trade tickets

Wonder if people would go to a Wembley final against an under 23 squad?

A boycott to that would surely be a huge statement!

Quoted from MarinerBen

Wonder if people would go to a Wembley final against an under 23 squad?

A boycott to that would surely be a huge statement!

Can’t speak for ‘people’ but I 100% guarantee that I would not go to Wembley or anywhere else to go to a game in this competition

Quoted from 75

At the last and rather infamous fans forum, John Fenty claimed the Under 23's format isn't intended as a gateway for U23 sides in the football league. He said it must be voted for by a large majority of the FL clubs. And I actually believe him to be fair, but I've still no interest in seeing Academy sides, I think it's a urine take, they think they can send their kids to play our proud and historic club? Not for me, I'll give it a wide berth again. I loved the competition as well, the only realistic chance of silverware. Should have just left it as it was but they've gone for the relative pittance the Premier league have bribed the clubs with. Sad.

When you look at the state of the owners across the football league that doesn't fill me with much confidence. They voted for it in this competition because the money was right so why wouldn't they do the same again for a bigger purse.

Quoted from 75

At the last and rather infamous fans forum, John Fenty claimed the Under 23's format isn't intended as a gateway for U23 sides in the football league. He said it must be voted for by a large majority of the FL clubs. And I actually believe him to be fair, but I've still no interest in seeing Academy sides, I think it's a urine take, they think they can send their kids to play our proud and historic club? Not for me, I'll give it a wide berth again. I loved the competition as well, the only realistic chance of silverware. Should have just left it as it was but they've gone for the relative pittance the Premier league have bribed the clubs with. Sad.

That's one of my biggest concerns. He's made a big thing of this point, saying on numerous occasions that it'd only take 8 clubs in the entire FL to
oppose their introduction to block it....but at no point has he ever said that HE or the club would vote against it. Would he be one of the brave 8? Absolutely not. He's already publicly supported the idea of B-Teams in the football league.

The thing is, it was only 4 or 5 years ago when the idea of Premier League B-Teams playing in any football league competition was absolutely unthinkable. Fast forward a few boozy FL Portugal Holidays and here we are, playing against Championship nobodies' youth teams. How much did it cost the Prem to get their way? £1m, or £50k from each team. It's absolutely nothing, a thousand tickets? 750 shirts? Chicken feed.

We're rapidly moving to a model where clubs at our level are becoming reliant not only on the annual solidarity payments, but now on money from competitions like this designed to benefit the Premier League clubs. Andy Holt at Accrington Stanley, a chairman who knows the value of a club's fans and community, spends a lot of his time on twitter defending the decision to allow PL teams into this competition purely because they can't afford to turn the money down. The PL have us over a barrel and the more we accept it, the deeper into their pocket we go.

I'm proud of the strength that town fans have shown so far and it's disappointing to see so many abandoning their principles that the held last season.

Quoted from Vance Warner

When you look at the state of the owners across the football league that doesn't fill me with much confidence. They voted for it in this competition because the money was right so why wouldn't they do the same again for a bigger purse.

You make a great point which I hadn't considered.

Scabs

Quoted from Helgy

a boycott means nothing to the EFL but costs your club money to host the games.

That's just completely untrue.

The EFL underwrite any losses incurred by clubs in this competition, which is why clubs like ours have knocked prices down to a quid or a fiver.

The Premier League and EFL don't really need any money, this is an operation in control and soft power. A few million quid means nothing to either, but massive reputational damage from being seen for the overbearing, competition-killing, money-hungry corporations that they are WOULD stop them forcing it through. Little clubs like Accrington and Rochdale sticking it up the Premier League would be one in the eye for them.

Quoted from MarinerBen

Wonder if people would go to a Wembley final against an under 23 squad?

A boycott to that would surely be a huge statement!

If we got to the final against Man Utd, and the club offered to pay for my travel, beer and food money, accomodation, sit me in the Royal box and gave me a VIP tour of Wembley, including meeting all the players, i still wouldn't go.

As Ska said, the money put into this by the Premier League is chicken feed. And the people running football league clubs like GTFC are supposed to be business men (and women, not forgetting Mansfield). Well if they are, it's no wonder the country is going to the dogs. If you're going to be hard-nosed about this, and say knickers to history and tradition, you should at least know the value of your 'product' and negotiate a decent price. I have no confidence in our chairman and most of the others to do this right, even on their own money obsessed terms.

With the exception of B teams I like the format.  If B teams enter the pyramid I suspect that they will seek to split League 2 north and south so that the turkeys (chairmen) don't feel like they are voting for Christmas.

I get that it is the Football League Trophy but I think teams from the top half of the Conference should be invited in the place of B teams whilst regionalising the groups.