A guide to the leagues and cups of English soccer
Vložit
- čas přidán 31. 05. 2024
- In this video which accompanies our blog post at groundhopperguides.com/guide-... Groundhopper Paul walks you through the entire pyramid of leagues of the English football system, from the Premier League in Tier 1 all the way down to Tier 11. He also introduces you to five of the major tournaments (or cups) of English soccer.
#groundhopping #football #PremierLeague #SkyBetChampionship #EFL #nonleague - Sport
As an English football fan since 1983 I knew all this but what a great and informative guide to fans of the game who didn’t know all about our league pyramid and our cup competitions. Excellent work!!
Much appreciated!
I’m a Brit and this was super useful, loads of stuff I didn’t know already!
Hey, glad to help!
Same
Even the Brits have bad time speaking English....." I didnt know already " 😂😂😂😂
You missed the most interesting part of non league. The yearly restructuring of the leagues. One year you're playing in the northern premiership division 1 South, next year you've been moved to the southern league due to the teams promoted and relegated between tiers. As an ex season ticket holder at warrington Town you also got to see a lot of phenoix teams that seem to always start in tier 9
I'll have to look into that, thanks!
I know exactly what you mean. I’m a fan of Kingstonian in the Isthmian league and I’ve experienced the same thing. Those Phoenix clubs, some of them get promoted pretty quickly and play in the isthmian league.
This year's Northern Premier League reshuffle, its a bit special this year with a new league being created www.thenpl.co.uk/202122-league-allocations-65931
My father played in tier nine in the Eastern Counties league for Clacton before they became FC Clacton in 2007. (The club now play in Essex Senior).
Born and raised in London, England and have watched football all my life so know all of this like the back of my hand but just wanted to say you explained it perfectly to a complete novice so bravo sir 👏🏻 10/10
Thanks so much!
As an American I'm exploring this topic while studying abroad in England and this video was so helpful! Your use of models and visuals made it so much easier to grasp since it is such a major and integral part of English culture! Thank you
You're most welcome! Glad to help.
In The Football League though, the top 2 clubs go up automatically while the third spot is fought over by 4 clubs in the play offs. The finals of which are also held at Wembley.
Just seen the club I support at 7:32, Step 6, ( Tier 10), Northern Counties East Division one, bottom of the list alphabetically Worsbrough Bridge, we were an old Colliery ( coal mining), club until the Govt. under Margaret Thatcher closed the mines. I've missed watching them during the pandemic but managed to get to a few games before the football was abandoned. Our attendances ( crowd) were around 230.
This channel is amazing and it reminds me of the time I had to explain how European football is organized to my NY friend who was eager to learn
Thanks!
Flackwell finally got noticed ! YAY !
Are you a supporter?
@@GroundhopperSoccerGuides yeah
I've been following premier league soccer for a while now but have always been fascinated by lower leagues. Thanks for the great breakdown!
You're very welcome! Glad you liked it and found it helpful.
I've recently gotten into association football and I've been watching a lot of videos and yours is truly and excellent breakdown. Thank so much sir!
Well, thanks so much! Happy to help, and I appreciate the kind words.
Top 6 Leagues in England:
1. Premier League
2. EFL Championship
3. EFL League One
4. EFL League Two
5. Vanarama National League
6a. National League North
6b. National League South
Awesome video
Thanks!
Thanks for video and also awesome an American explaining this!!!
Before the advent of the Premier League the Football league consisted of Divisions 1, 2, 3 & 4. (Until 1958 Leagues 3 & 4 were known as Third Division North and South.) Until 1986 this was virtually a closed shop. At the end of each season the bottom 2, 3 or 4 teams (it changed over time) had to apply for re-election to the league. My team (Hartlepool United) hold the record for re-election with 14 applications (they were never voted out but were finally relegated to the National League at the end of the 2016-17 season and just regained their league status by winning the National League Play-off final in 2021).
I imagine that "re-election" was process was rather fraught. Also, it never fails to confuse us Americans when "the Championship" or "Division One" are in fact the second tier!
@@GroundhopperSoccerGuides Re-election wasn't that fraught. It was virtually guaranteed that the bottom teams would be re-elected because the other teams all knew that one day they might be in the same position and would need the rest of the league to vote for them. I can only recall one team ever not being re-elected. That was Barrow in the 1970's and I suspect that was mainly to do with geography. Barrow is stuck out on the North-west coast miles from anywhere and I think the other teams got sick of having to go there. However Barrow are now back in the league having won the National League in 2020.
Another beauty of the FA Cup, you can have situations where big clubs go to really small clubs grounds for actual competitive football, usually boosts these clubs revenue massively.
One of our favorite parts of the FA Cup!
And the best part about it is that there are still leagues below the 11th tier, going down to the 20th tier in certain parts of the country, where technically if they keep getting promoted each year for 21 seasons, they can get to the premier league…
Beautifully explained, thanks
Thanks! And you’re welcome.
Detailed explanation. Loved your way of presentation. Thanks uncle. 😊
Glad you liked it
Thanks. From an English guy, this was great. Pity our national team can't win anything...
We aren’t the only one
San Marino Lack goals
Great info. Thanks a lot.
Thanks! Glad you liked it.
This was fantastic! Well explained 😁
Thanks! 😃
Very good information, Thank you for share it with us.
Glad it was helpful!
Great vid, thanks for this informative video
Really useful, I knew it all but still watched. Really well made!
Glad you enjoyed it!
Thank you this is helping me to understand it easily
Fantastic video Paul!! Loved the visuals which give viewers a sense of the complexity of the pyramid. Hope you are well and hope you get to go to games soon.
I wish this video had been around when I was working on my Claret and Blue post. I found Westfields and South Shields and some other teams way down the ladder and I had no idea how they fit into the league structure.
Glad you liked it! And I don't know about you, but I find it really hard to even watch games without fans.
I've actually been to South Shield! Not to a game, but the town is famous for a seaside row of South Asian restaurants. It's near Sunderland and some Mackems took me there for dinner.
@@GroundhopperSoccerGuides Agreed. Really miss the roar and anticipation.
South Shields have amazing support. They average over 1500 per game, when you consider only 3 other teams in the northern Premier league got over 500 average attendance.
Great video
In the MLS we do have trophies won by multiple clubs right now we're in the Lamar hunt us open cup tournament it's the oldest tournament in the USA and one of the qualifiers to concacaf champions league
thanks for your explaination
You are welcome
Loved the video 👏👏 Good job
Thank you!!
AFC Wimbledon is a good example of a how meritocratic the English league pyramid is. They were formed in 2002 and have been promoted 6 times to go from an amateur to fully professional club (Tier 9 to 3). It's becoming more and more rare, but the possibility is always there for a team of amateurs to earn the right to play professionally. That's the main reason there are so many clubs in European football.
Amazing story, and I can't wait to get to Plough Lane! groundhopperguides.com/wimbledon-comes-home-to-plough-lane/
That’s a decent map you have behind you. I’m at the bit in the centre of the south coast where we have AFC Bournemouth ( from the now co joined Bournemouth Poole Christchurch conurbation) , Southampton and Portsmouth. There’s a good documentary about the rivalry between the latter called “ my city could beat up your city “ . We support AFC Bournemouth whom made it to the top league after 100 years . Yeovil are over the ‘ mountain’ and come from Darkest North Dorset & Somerset where Farming is more prevalent. Keep up the good work 👍😁
The English pyramid system , there is nothing quite like it anywhere else. Notts County in tier 5 just had a crowd of 12,800 .No other country in the world could draw such a large crowd at that level.
Well, to be fair, nobody else in the history of the National League ever did it, either!
@@GroundhopperSoccerGuides Although the previous record was over 11,000 and Wrexham got 10,500 recently.
Great video, absolutely brilliant. I'm shocked to find Americana with such a deep understanding and appreciation of our game. From the bottom of my heart, thank you.
Check out a channel called bunch of amateurs, if you're not already watching. They follow non league amateur clubs way down the football pyramid. I think you and your subscribers would love it.
Keep up the good work, I'll be watching from now on.
Subscribed now, thanks!
Very very useful video
Glad you think so!
The championship playoff final is played at Wembley too
I already know the entire format and everything but man i love rewatching every now and then
Wow, thanks!
Great video. The documentary “Welcome to Wrexham” started me down this path of learning how these UK soccer leagues work and the sport in general. One question I have is where can I go to get notifications sent to my phone for Wrexham? I checked both the ESPN and CBS app and they had nothing for that particular team.
They probably will next year
try OneFootball
Good work. 🏴🇺🇸
Very good video!!!
Thanks! Glad you liked it.
Featuring a team local to me - Flackwell Heath, about 7 miles from home. Holmer Green is a mile walk, much prefer footy at this level to the league, even though I support Wycombe Wanderers.
Thanks you...i really confius about soccer
Happy to help
good video, no fluff, no bs, just what i wanted.
Thanks! Glad you liked it.
Nice job Paul-- very clear explanation. I'm curious-- what's the lowest tier club you've ever visited / seen play?
Thanks! For me, that's Dulwich Hamlet, National League South, tier 6. Happened to catch them on a big day with a near-sellout of 3,000 people.
My club FC Isle of man has just entered the nwcfl at teir 9. Doing well atm in 4th posistion. First time a manx side has ever played in the english league and they have a 3,000 seater ground called the bowl. We also broke attendance records for our league with over 2,000 fans the first home game, more than many teams much higher up the pyramid.
Well done! We'll have to make it there someday.
@@GroundhopperSoccerGuides thanks, due to covid we've had to go away for nearly all our games, (20 min flight to main land) but now were allowed home games, so weve got like 17 in a row now to end the season :) weve been featured in the atlandtic sports mag, and fourfourtwo aswell as bbc news to name but a few, super pround to have been apart of it.
in the MLS we do have other tournaments throughout the season the U.s open cup and the Mls cup plus CCL and the Canadian cup
True, and thanks. We got into that a little in our "world structure of football" video. czcams.com/video/vb9rIMa8FSc/video.html
@@GroundhopperSoccerGuides thanks oh I forgot about the USL championship it's kinda like rookie league
@@AZWMKWofficialstarNinjaGeneral especially since it has MLS reserve sides in it!
Managed to stumble on this video and Yeovil is only a 10 minute journey from me. I remember when united came to visit! Weird to hear an American on CZcams mention our town 😄
I’m a northern league division one fan
The “Official “ Pyramid goes down 12 levels though in some counties, local league systems can go as deep 20.
Still with promotion and relegation?
@@GroundhopperSoccerGuides Yup
so that means a level 20 team can go to the pl? are they in the fa cup? are they proffesional or non-proffesional. are they sunday league
@@thedictationofallah yes they can go to pl but it will probably never happen
Good video, don't think I've ever seen or heard an American who has such interest in lower league Football in this country...
The Village I live in used to have a team in the Northern League (Steps 5 and 6), they ended up getting relegated to the Step 7 Northern Alliance and a few years ago moved to the Wearside League, but unfortunately went out of existence...
But the team I support is Darlington, in the National League North...
Thanks! I try :-). And I can't wait to make it up the North East again.
You should do a video on the US Soccer league system. That’s even messier. There are regional and state leagues whose organization are hard to understand.
It's just chaos over here! But you're right, and I may give it a shot.
at a recent concacaf meeting the League cup MLS vs liga mx go at it for a extra spot in the concacaf champions league
I was searching for a video that explained all the leagues in England and I got excatly what I wanted 👍
Well, we're happy to help!
as a foreigner who study in uk for 6 months, can I play for non-league (step5-7) or i can play only sunday league? thanks.
Shows how difficult it is to make it too Premier
Nice video, already a little out of date as the Southern League has had 2 divisions at step 3 (tier 7) for a couple of seasons, making 4 at that level. This summer it's been a major reorganisation with another league added at step 4, making a proper 1-2-4-8-16 pyramid.
Thanks for the info!
This is exactly what I was looking for 😂 it can be confusing
Glad to help!
Sir can you make a video about grassroot football of England like about what age children can train and join academy , how do children get selected for U-12 to U-19 , school program etc.
This is a very informativ video Sir... very impressed... i hope some of your fellow americans watches this. and hopefully can stay focused for this 13 mins LOL
Yes, let's hope :-).
“Hey who is Sheffield United” 😂😂😂😂
That cracked me up
Now I’d just love to do an FM save that’s just English leagues going down as far as possible without my PC going bye
This is useful, my young daughter has got into football in a big way and wants to go to a match, myself and my wife are not into football so we have been a bit lost with it all, but I am learning fast, this video was very useful. Can I ask what Super League is, we want to watch the Woman's Chelsea matches at Kingsmeadow, and the are Super League?
The Women's Super League is the top league in the women's league pyramid -- so it's like the Premier League in that sense. Chelsea are definitely Super League, along with Arsenal and Tottenham among the London clubs.
I love football as well
EFL divisions. Not the best/top three go up necessarily but the top two and the winner of the play-offs, a post regular season comp between teams finishing 3rd, 4th, 5th and 6th. BS really but a money spinner and can be very exciting.
Been watching EPL for a couple years and stumbled upon your video doing some research!
Are your tier 8-9 clubs generally like rec league sports in the US? Generally a bunch of guys past their prime reliving their glory days just getting together to drink a couple times a week and have fun?
Hey Ben, welcome! Glad you found us. These tier 8 and 9 clubs would be more like young guys trying to get started or maybe guys who are good enough to play at a pretty high level just not professionally. So maybe what we would call in my hometown "competitive rec league," but maybe even a little above that. Some players at these levels might be getting $100 or $200 a week.
@@GroundhopperSoccerGuides awesome thanks for the response! At first everything about the EPL and how that all worked was rather daunting but I’m getting there haha!
@@l3Dub24 Yeah, there's a lot to track. I remember the first time I heard an announcer say that Man City's next four games were in four different competitions, and I thought my head would explode!
Absolutely not ,the standard in levels 8 and 9 is highly competitive.
6:50 Oh man that poster…
So many leagues and so many teams. You get the feeling the entire population of england belongs to a team and plays football. Any more tiers below you run out of people. 🤷♂️😁
A lot of people also support two clubs, one "big" one and their local one.
Hello, im a brit and i was never interested in football when i was younger so i never knew anything about football beside the rules in the field and basics, this is really helpful and do you have any other videos on all the famous football teams in england and do you have any videos on football clubs and how to improve at football
We have a lot of videos on the clubs, so have a look around. Nothing on how to improve at it, though.
@@GroundhopperSoccerGuides is there a playlist on clubs?
Why does the map in the background have 2 Irelands?
Ha! Good catch. One is just an inset on a different scale to get the whole thing in.
Could you please make a video Explaining how to create a football team eg watford and the requirements just out of curiosity.
Interesting idea, thanks!
Bristol Telephones is a badass team name
What I wonder (I don’t know if You’d be able to answer this either) but I wonder what the skill level for players looks like down in tiers below tier 5 or 6. At some point it must become just walk on teams for fun
That point is well below tiers 5 and 6, I know that much. Many of those clubs are semi pro.
I sincerely hope you get the chance to visit some Wearside League or Northern Alliance Games at some point...I'm sure you'll be made most welcome at places like Annfield Plain or Farringdon Detached
I'd love to ... but Farringdon *Detached"? What's the story there?
@@GroundhopperSoccerGuides Hey there, never realised you replied to me 5 months ago, but I come across your channel again...
I'm not sure about Farringdon Detached, Farringdon is a suburb of Sunderland, I think the Detached is a Club of some kind, possibly a Youth and Community Club, in those divisions you also find a few Pub Teams playing and also U-23/Reserve teams of teams higher up the pyramid...
Nice to be back on the Channel, I love the fact an American is explaining English Football
what tier do they start considering it amateur, or non pro football
It will depend on the club. Typically the 92 were considered pro and below amateur but increasing numbers of teams in tier 5 are fully professional. It's more to do with the resources a club has as to whether they can run a pro operation and pay players coaches nutritionists conditioners etc. I knew a lad who was semi pro and 15 years ago he was getting £300 a game but he still had a day job as his club was pro despite being T5
Very good video. I don't even know there are so many cups in England.
Thanks! 😃
@@GroundhopperSoccerGuides Hello，I use a bit of time and make a Chinese version subtitle for this video.Would you like to have a try？
I’m American and this is crazy
I feel like there's so many teams there that I could probably at keast make it on to a step 7 club. How much would I be paid to play in front of 27 people ?
A cup of tea at halftime :-)
I’m from
High Wycombe
Which is basically same as Flackwell Health right next to it lol
there are promotion playoffs 3-6 play in a playoff for promotion in tier 2-4
Thanks!
@@GroundhopperSoccerGuides Can you make guides to other countries like Spain, Italy, Germany ect
Is it possible for me to do from the non league side?
Do you mean do a video on non-league football? We'll get on that, thanks.
Both, but sorry I did a mistake.
I mean for me as a player looking for a team to join from non league side is it possible for me without getting trials or is it possible for me to join like that base on my performance I showcase in front of the coach and officials of the team without a trials program. I just want to know pls sir
Gimna sistem kamera di liga bisa bgus cara gimna
Is the Community Shield considered a trophy or is just a over glorified friendly?
I'm pretty sure it's just a friendly, which people enjoy but don't worry too much about winning or losing. Just a fun day out at Wembley in nice weather with not much on the line.
I believe it is played a week before the season starts. The winners of the FA cup and the Premier League square off. Just a trophy I think.?
Jose Mourinho notoriously considers it a trophy - I believe Pep Guardiola agrees with him on that.
You'll also find a lot of Arsenal and Man U fans in particular bigging up their Community Shields in order to outdo Liverpool/Spurs fans in total trophies won.
But the Community Shield used to be called the Charity Shield because it was a game played FOR Charity!
It's not like the European Super Cup between the winners of the Champions League and Europa League.
Fans and Media tend to use it as a barometer of how well the two teams {League Champions and Cup Winners/Cup Runners Up if the League Champions also won the Cup} are likely to do each season because it is played at the start of the season {basically the opening game of the new season} rather than at the end of the season. But in essence it's meaningless as it's a one-off game between two clubs who are more interested in getting match-fit for the season than anything else.
Basically it's the equivalent of an NFL Pre-Season game only with a trophy at the end of it.
I've always had a idea that the winner should get 3 points giving to them as an advantage in their league to spice it up. But I know fellow English men would prob hate the idea.
There are other leagues in American soccer and Baseball forsure. I think for all of them tho. They just don't get as much attention.
Baseball gets more attention that soccer here, obviously, but it's weird that those clubs aren't truly independent, in that they don't control their player contracts. I wish the lower soccer leagues could have some version of promotion and relegation.
So each town in England has like 12 football teams ?
Usually just one each, but some cities have a few -- and of course Greater London has like 20
EFL trophy used to be a good little competition, always felt a bit tacky and shit since the u-23 sides came into it and a group stage was added
That kind of ruined it for a lot of people, didn't it? One more concession to the powerful and wealthy at the expense of tradition and everybody else.
Exactly and unfortunately I never got to see us win in 2011 and now won't even be bothered if we win it again given the current format
I played in the Gothia Cup in Sweden, and people were complaining about a u-17 team from England being a "professional" team.
this was in 1991 and I never absorbed any of the particulars about what level "pro" they were. I am from the U.S. and played good enough to get the respect of a couple of their best players, but the rest of my team were being a bunch of cry babies...
I loved playing in that match and I wonder now what level their team actually would have been.
*also had an invitation to play on some club were you get Oxford accreditation schooling credits while you play, any idea how the competition a team like that plays in wouldcompare to any of these lower leagues?
Pls reply to me because he missed tier 10-19
I'll get to that in another video, thanks!
Or the National League North and the National League South as we say up here.
So what are La liga and world cup?
Can Manchester United play in world cups.... explain this stuff....
czcams.com/video/vb9rIMa8FSc/video.html
Fun fact the safest leauge in English football levels is Tier 4 the EFL 2
Safest?
tier 4 has 4 promotions and two relegation spots making it the safest leauge
@@lukechadwick2882 Not if your team is in the bottom 2
fun fact: sunderland are forever stuck in the 3rd division, 2026 (prime jack diamond if he still players) may help
You forgot county cups 😆 mostly irrelevant but otherwise great job! If love the see a pyramid I'm US soccer below the MLS.
Football!
Association Football!
@@GroundhopperSoccerGuides Incorrect, that refers to the league system. Football is the actual game.
Community Shield is missing.
I didn't consider it a competitive thing that anybody really cares about. Do you feel differently?
It exists so might as well explain it seems to be what your channels about.
Fylde is indeed pronounced "filled".
Thanks!
I'm from yeovil
Many thanks, now I know. With these structures you would expect to see England win many world cups. Unfortunately their top flight is filled with many foreign players who end up beating them at world cups. Very sad for England.
England is getting a little better, though!
Growing up I watched Cardiff City go from League 2 to League 1 to the Championship and even to the Prem (and then back down, up, and down again lol). We also narrowly missed out on the FA Cup and League Cup, to Portsmouth and Liverpool. All three times I've been to Wembley we've lost (the other time was the play-off final for promotion). I absolutely can't imagine having a system like American sport. Where's the excitement if there are no real stakes ? Anyway, nice video, butt!
Thanks! The excitement in the States is that every team with halfway decent management can build a championship team within 3-5 years. That just doesn't exist in the English system.
I still don't (I guess refuse) understand the purpose of any other cup other than the FA cup. To me, there is no purpose of a subset competition when you already have an all inclusive competition. But that's just me
I guess they just think the lower levels should have a chance to compete on their own?
Because lower league teams deserve a chance of some silverware and prize money at least. They can't compete with Premiership teams in the carabao/FA cup so trophies like papa John's is necessary for them to compete with each other
Carabao Cup is also useful since the winner gains a place in European competitions