FA Trophy

[Elite_Pie]

We enter the draw at 1pm today for the next round. It's usually broadcast live on Talksport, but I can't see any mention of it in their schedules. The game should take place on Dec 18th but Forest are at home that day, so if we get a home game we would probably play on the Friday as we are at Chesterfield on Tuesday 21st.

[Glad2BeAPie]

Another competition we can do without

[Notts78]

Another competition we can do without

Disagree. As long as IB utilises the squad and maybe integrates a few youth team players, it’s a great way to develop and keep match fit players who don’t normally play.
From memory the first couple of rounds of this Trophy are factored in to our fixture list so it’s not like a game will be postponed.

[jacobncfc]

Disagree. As long as IB utilises the squad and maybe integrates a few youth team players, it’s a great way to develop and keep match fit players who don’t normally play.
From memory the first couple of rounds of this Trophy are factored in to our fixture list so it’s not like a game will be postponed.

This. I don’t particularly care whether we progress, but it’s useful to get players a competitive 90 minutes who haven’t been playing.

The only issue we have is we don’t have much depth at the back, so we’re probably going to have to play some first choice defenders.

[ireallyhateforest]

I do know that for the FA Trophy fixtures in the previous round, there was no extra time or replay, just straight to penalties.

Hopefully that rule will continue for the rest of the competition.

[ncfcog]

Altrincham at home.

[Bushwacka]

Disagree. As long as IB utilises the squad and maybe integrates a few youth team players, it’s a great way to develop and keep match fit players who don’t normally play.

Would normally agree, but there's only really Brooks, Knight (is he fit?) and Sam (plus Doyle) that fit into that category. Everyone else has been getting a start at some point. The youth team this year is very young and inexperienced and would get trounced by the likes of Altrincham.

[Notts78]

Would normally agree, but there's only really Brooks, Knight (is he fit?) and Sam (plus Doyle) that fit into that category. Everyone else has been getting a start at some point. The youth team this year is very young and inexperienced and would get trounced by the likes of Altrincham.

I would add Kairo Mitchell to that and Ed Francis. Both get little game time.
The players I’d be looking to protect are the ones I consider key (hopefully you agree) - Cameron, Palmer, Ruben and Wootton. I consider those 4 in particular absolute key to our success this season and they make the spine of the side.
There are others that in there day are very good but these are the 4 I would have no where near the match day squad v Altrincham.
To be fair if we put out a side that has 4/5 youth teamers we may get trounced. The reality is that Alti probably won’t go full strength either.
Either way whether we win or lose, it’s not overly important. Keeping players fit or getting a player or 2 to show IB they deserve a start IMO is what that game is about.

[jacobncfc]

Would normally agree, but there's only really Brooks, Knight (is he fit?) and Sam (plus Doyle) that fit into that category. Everyone else has been getting a start at some point. The youth team this year is very young and inexperienced and would get trounced by the likes of Altrincham.

We tend to use our squad pretty well, but I think you can add Mitchell, O’Brien, Chicksen, Nemane and possibly Rawlinson/Kelly-Evans if they’ve lost their places now to a list of players who could likely do with a game by the time this one comes around.

[nw6pie]

On the one hand, it's not that many games:

Third Round Proper Saturday 18 December 2021
Fourth Round Proper Saturday 15 January 2022
Fifth Round Proper Saturday 12 February 2022 (we're away at Solihull Moors that day)
Sixth Round Proper Saturday 12 March 2022 (we're away at Stockport that day)
Semi Final Saturday 2 April 2022 (we're away at Southend that day)
Final Sunday 22 May 2022 (can't see any confirmed dates, but I assume this is around the time the playoffs will be happening)

On the other hand, we have a small squad and it's potentially three away games we'd have to rearrange, plus there's the odd timing of the final coinciding with the playoffs. Of course, there's no guaranteed that we won't have to rearrange those three away games anyway depending on how the other teams fare in the cup.