The fixtures for the 2021-22 Ebac Northern Football League season will be released at 9am on Monday (21 June), the league announced at its virtual annual general meeting on Saturday.
The Northern League’s two divisions are scheduled to begin on Saturday 31 July and conclude on Saturday 16 April 2022.
The new season is starting earlier because of the coronavirus pandemic affecting the last two non-league football seasons. It will also see many clubs return to competitive league action for the first time in nine months.
The league have previously announced they will give priority to league fixtures when drawing up the calendar, with the Brooks Mileson Memorial League Cup and the Ernest Armstrong Memorial Cup being organised for later in the season.
The 2020-21 season was suspended in November before being cancelled in February by the Football Association (FA) for a second consecutive year.
The FA then decided to go ahead with the delayed restructuring of the National League System (NLS) this summer, combining results from the ‘null and void’ 2019-20 season and the ‘curtailed’ 2020-21 season to decide which clubs would gain promotion on an overall points per game over the two-year period.
Amongst the decisions, West Allotment Celtic, Redcar Athletic and Crook Town were moved up to Division 1. They were replaced in Division 2 by Blyth Town (from the Northern Football Alliance), Horden Community Welfare (Wearside Football League) and Redcar Town (North Riding Football League).
We’ll have all the details of the new season fixtures from 9am on Monday across all our social media channels (@NorthShieldsFC).
The full Ebac Northern Football League 2021-22 line-up…
Division 1 (Step 5): Ashington, Billingham Town, Bishop Auckland, Consett, Crook Town, Guisborough Town, Newcastle Benfield, Newton Aycliffe, North Shields, Northallerton Town, Penrith, Redcar Athletic, Ryhope Colliery Welfare, Seaham Red Star, Sunderland Ryhope CA, Thornaby, West Allotment Celtic, West Auckland Town, Whickham, Whitley Bay.
