I've noticed that some of the posts from the club have gold on them

Which would make sense given it was traditional this year. Poss with some gold flashes as the clubs comms have gold on them.

Just don't get 'loop games are meaningless' brigade.

Last time I looked they all carried 2 points, agree it is far from ideal but the club need the fixtures.

Knock 3 home games off & the season would be VERY short. Clubs don't want 2 more clubs to further dilute the TV revenue. Little interest in bringing back Yorkshire or John Player type tournaments . Personally I would bring SL teams into the cup much earlier but at best that would add a couple of games - likely with weakened teams & shared revenue.

Its the reptetition thats the issue, we seem to have played Cas repeatedly over the last 5 years. And theres some unfairness in how competitve the draw is and how attractive the games are. For example next year we are lucky with crowd pulling games against Rovers and Leeds, in 2022 we had Toulouse twice with a poor crowd for the 2nd one

Have a quick look down Paragon Arcade between Paragon Street and Carr Lane. Smart down there now with independent shops, cafes and street food type places.