National League North and South Stadiums & Stats

James Pope [CC BY-SA 3.0], via Wikimedia Commons

The National League used to be known as the Football Conference and is essentially the ‘non-league’ section of the English football system, but there are still thousands of loyal fans that turn out to support the competing teams week to week.

There are two levels to the National League section of the pyramid and we’re interested here in the National League North & the National League South, which both sit on the second level and are equal to each other, separated only by location.

We’ll give you a little bit of information about both of them here, as well as tell you about the league’s history and its structure. Firstly, though, we’ll fill you in on the sort of stadiums that you can expect to find were you to pay a visit to the homes of teams in the second-tier of the National League.

Let's get cracking.

Stadium Stats

Team Stats

Ticket Prices

National League North and South Stadiums

There are rarely any ‘definites’ when it comes to football. We’d love to say with confidence right now that Manchester United will always be in the Premier League, for example, but we’d probably have said the same thing about other European Cup winning teams such as Nottingham Forest and Aston Villa in the past.

The sort of stadiums you’re likely to find National League North & South football being played in, therefore, can change year to year and occasionally you can find previously more successful teams slumming it down there with grounds boasting capacities as high as 10,000. That said, the majority of stadiums are small affairs that can welcome about 5,000 people or less. They tend to have a mix of a limited degree of seating and a larger standing area.

Roger Cornfoot / Aggborough Stadium, Kidderminster

About The League

English_ceremonial_counties_2010.svg: Nilfanionderivative work: Delusion23 [CC BY-SA 3.0 or GFDL], via Wikimedia Commons

The National Leagues are sponsored by Vanarama, so the official titles of the divisions on level six of the English Football League pyramid are the Vanarama National League North and the Vanarama National League South. They are equal with each other, however, and are separated in order to allow teams from similar geographical locations to avoid having to travel long distances - and incur large costs - in order to play their matches.

There are twenty-two teams in each league and newly promoted or demoted teams get separated into the Northern or Southern division depending on where in the country they are based. Teams from the North of England, North Wales, Norfolk, and the Midlands play in the National League North and teams from the more Southernly locations enter the National League South. The top team of each division gets automatic promotion to the National League and there is then a play-off in each league between the teams placed 2nd to 5th. The bottom three clubs are relegated out of the division.

National League North and South History

The Northern and Southern branches of the National Football League were added in 2004, back when it was known as the Football Conference. In those days they were called Conference North and Conference South. It was a major restructuring of the non-league part of English football that revitalised the game in the lower divisions.

Mattythewhite [CC BY-SA 3.0 or GFDL], from Wikimedia Commons

In 2006 the structure changed once more when the Conference National expanded from having 22 teams in it to having 24 teams. This allowed for four teams to be promoted and four to be relegated. Two teams entered from both of the Conference North and the Conference South, with two from the Conference National entering each league to maintain the balance. The re-branding as the National League North and National League South occurred in 2015.