Spotlight On “Non-League” Football

I turned the spotlight on the Football League last month.

With the season coming to a close, I thought I’d have a go with non-league football.

My interest in non-league has grown over the last 32 years.

About 4 or 5 years ago, I discovered Tony Kempster’s excellent site, containing details of tables and attendances for all leagues in the first 11 levels of the English football league system, including the National League System, the 7 levels below the Football League.  The National League System, first implemented in 2004, gave non-league football a much better structure than it had before.

The term “non-league” doesn’t make as much sense as it did before the introduction of automatic promotion and relegation between the fourth and fifth levels of English football in 1987 and the formation of the Premier League in 1992.

With the advent of automatic promotion and relegation between the Football League and the Football Conference in 1987, and the subsequent increase to two clubs promoted and two clubs relegated in 2003, there is an increasing number of former non-league clubs in the Football League and vice versa.

Oxford United, who were in the top flight as recently as 1988, have been in the Conference National (5th level) since 2006.   Having won the League Cup in 1986, Oxford United became “the first former winners of a major trophy to be relegated from the league”.  They will be joined there next season by another League Cup winner, Luton Town, who were in the top flight as recently as 1992, and who beat Arsenal 3-2 in the 1988 League Cup Final.  They were relegated from League Two to the Conference National last week.

The formation of AFC Wimbledon and FC United of Manchester are interesting stories in their own right, and their respective rises through non-league football has been meteoric:

• Wimbledon entered the Combined Counties League (9th level) in 2002, and after 4 promotions in 6 seasons, including a second successive one this season, they will play in the Conference National next season.
• FCUM entered the North West Counties Football League Second Division (10th level) in 2005, and after three successive promotions, now find themselves in the Northern Premier League Premier Division (7th level).  They are currently in the play-off places for promotion to the Conference North, with just one game left to play.

Both clubs have enjoyed the highest home attendances in non-league football since they entered the system.

AFC Liverpool were formed last year for Liverpool fans who found that going to going to watch Liverpool at Anfield had become too expensive.  AFC Liverpool are currently fourth in the North West Counties Division One.  Their average home attendance of 338, while very small compared to AFC Wimbledon and FCUM, is higher than that of many clubs two or even three levels higher than them.

On average, for every two rounds of league games, about 120,000 people in England go to watch football at levels 5 to 8 in England.  This compares very favourably with an average of 75,299 who watch Manchester United at home, or 60,032 who watch Arsenal at home (assuming that for every two rounds of matches, on average, one is home and one is away).

The average attendance in the Conference National is about 1,748, comparable with that for the S. League.

With less to lose, non-league clubs are prepared to try novel approaches to club ownership and management, for example:

• Ebbsfleet United of the Conference National:  “Since February 2008, the club has been owned by the web-based venture MyFootballClub, whose members may vote on team selection and player transfers, instead of those decisions being made exclusively by the club’s management and staff as at most other clubs.”

• Fisher Athletic of the Conference South:  On 18 February 2009, “Turnstile operator [Donna] Powell, 27, got the opportunity to take over from boss Dave Mehmet for one game after raising £500 for the south London club.”

Burton Albion, who had taken a commanding lead in the Conference National before Nigel Clough left early in January 2009 to take over at Derby County, have had a poor run of results of late (including a 1-2 loss away to Kidderminster Harriers and a 0-1 loss at home to Oxford United in their last two games) and are at risk missing out on automatic promotion.

With just one game left to play, they are 3 points ahead of Cambridge United, another former Football League club, with the following games to be played this weekend:

• Cambridge United v Altrincham (in 15th place and with nothing to play for)
• Torquay United (another former Football League club in 5th place and needing a win to confirm a play-off place) v Burton Albion

It may come down to goal difference – Burton Albion on +30, while Cambridge United are on +26.

The notion of the English football league system as a “pyramid” comes across most clearly from levels 5 to 8.