Checkatrade - the round of 16

[Pitchfork]

Draw tomorrow: Yeovil of Portsmouth at home would be my picks....whatever the game it will be dwarfed by FAC Rd 3 if we make it

We will be ball number three in Friday’s Checkatrade Trophy third round draw.

The draw for round three of the Checkatrade Trophy will take place live on TalkSport at 12.30pm on Friday, December 8, with the fixtures scheduled to take place the week commencing January 8, 2018

The draw for the last 16 will be regionalised into northern and southern sections, but will revert to an open draw from the quarter-finals onwards.

Here is the full list of ball numbers in our section:


SOUTHERN SECTION

1.Charlton Athletic

2.Chelsea U21

3.Forest Green Rovers

4.Luton Town

5.Oxford United

6.Peterborough United

7.Portsmouth

8. Yeovil Town

[Silver Surfer]

Home to Chelsea would be fun. Away to Luton wouldn't.

[Tommo]

Chelsea home or away would be fun. They must be favourites and be full of interesting players for the future. Otherwise a home draw would be nice.

[Seat C32]

Portsmouth at home

[Pitchfork]

That's strange, I heard Yeovil away!!

[Seat C32]

Portsmouth at home.

[Seat C32]

Sorry Twitter originally did say Portsmouth but now it's been changed to Yeovil away.

[Pitchfork]

Portsmouth at home.

Sorry Seat C32 - it is Yeovil away!!!

[Pitchfork]

I think Twitter originally listed all the teams in order of ball numbers - this made it look like Portsmouth at home for us. Blame the Twitter feed for your mistake

[Tommo]

Pity - would have enjoyed Portsmouth at home. Still, the Yeovil game is more winnable I think.

[Pitchfork]

Amazingly there are NO non-league teams in the 3rd round of the F.A.Cup - this has hardly ever happened before.

The lowest ranked team are Yeovil who will play Bradford in the next round....hoping for a win to carry them through to the 4th round.

I think this, and the league, will be their priority which will help us in our Checkatrade match against them in January. Of course the league must also remain our priority!

[michael]

I thin k most of us (certainly me -and frankly-i think the manager as well ) have been/were caught out by the difference on standard between EFL and national league.
a bigger gap than previously ?

just look at how even lowly FGR controlled the game v high flyers macclesfield so comfortably

does the fact that no non league teams in 3rd round-reflect that widening gap ?

[T50 BOS]

Could be one conclusion but then again we didn't make it to R3 either !

[Tommo]

I think that you might be right Michael. The gap between top of the Conference/National League and the EFL 2 was certainly bigger than I expected based on what I had seen of EFL 2, of and on, over the last 3-4 years. Maybe that is reflected further up the leagues too. Maybe too, the EFL teams are concentrating more on the FA Cup than in previous years though I don't know why that would be the case.