League History

2024/2025

The FAW National League board (NLB) confirmed the Lock Stock Ardal Northern leagues for the 2024-2025 season

In the Lock Stock Ardal Northeast Penrhyncoch have been promoted to the JD Cymru North and Welshpool Town and Llanrhaeadr YM relegated

In the Lock Stock Ardal Northwest Flint Mountain and Llay Welfare have been promoted and Bethesda Athletic, Hawarden Rangers and Saltney Town relegated

Chirk AA, Llanidloes Town and Porthmadog relegated from the JD Cymru North, joining the leagues from the Area associations are Corwen and Connahs Quay Town from the North East Wales FA. Kerry from the Central Wales FA and Trearddur Bay, NFA and Menai Bridge Tigers from the North Wales Coast FA

LOCK STOCK ARDAL LEAGUES 2024-2025

 
2023/2024

At the end of a season that took forty three weeks to complete Penrhyncoch won the Lock Stock Ardal Northeast league Flint Mountain the Lock Stock Ardal Northwest, Llay Welfare beat Llanuwchllyn on penalties to gain the third promotion to the JD Cymru North. Holyhead Hotspur defeated Flint Mountain to win the Lock Stock Ardal Northern league cup.

Welshpool Town and Llanrhaeadr YM were relegated from the Lock Stock Ardal Northeast and Bethesda Athletic, Hawarden Rangers and Saltney Town from the Lock Stack Ardal Northwest

Penrhyncoch Gari Lewis was manager of the season in the Northeast and Flint Mountain’s Aden Shannon in the Northwest

Dan Owen of Penrhyncoch and Max Peate of Llay Welfare were voted players of the season in their respective leagues

On the eve of the season Barmouth withdrew from the Ardal Northest leaving the league to run with fifteen teams

The FAW National league board (NLB) considered relegation to and from the leagues as well as the clubs who had applied for a vacancy and decided the following leagues for the 2023/2024

2022/23 Season

Denbigh Town became the first club to win the double as they lifted the Ardal Northwest and Ardal Northern league cup

Caersws won the Ardal Northeast championship with two games to play

At the end of February Llandudno informed the league that they would be resigning from the league at the end of the season

Having failed to raise a team for three games Bodedern resigned from the Ardal Northwest league at the end of 2022 leaving the league with fourteen teams for the remainder of the season

Six games into the season Rhydymwyn resigned from the Ardal Northwest leaving the league to run with fifteen teams

Two weeks before the start of the season Berriew informed the league they would be resigning due to a lack of first team players, they were not replaced and the Arda Northeast league ran with fifteen teams

At the end of June Machynlleth informed the league they would be resigning from the Lock Stock Ardal Northeast, they were replaced by Llangollen Town who had applied to the FAW fill a vacancy as per FAW pyramid regulations

2021/22 season

At the AGM in June Mike Cunningham (Mold Alex) and Mark Griffiths (Caersws) were named as manager of the seasons and Josh Astley (Llanfair United) and Danny Warren were named as the players of the season

It was confirmed that Chirk AAA, Mold Alex and Porthmadog were promoted to the JD Cymru North with St Asaph. Brymbo, Blaebau Ffestiniog, Carno, Kerry and Four Crosses relegated with Penparcau resigning. Bodedern, Rhyl 1879 and Flint Mountain were promoted from the feeder leagues with Llanrhaear YM, Llangefni Town relegated from the JD Cymru North league. Llandrindod Wells and Rhayader Town were moved from the Ardal Sourthen leagues and Bangor1879 and Hawarden Rangers found themselves in the leagues after the FAW confirmed they would fill vacancy's and Llanuwchllyn moved from the Northwest to the Northeast league

The two Ardal Northern leagues were confirmed as

On May 21st, Porthmadog became the third promoted team after beating Caersws five nil in the first ever Lock Stock Northern play off game with Rhys Alun Williams firing a hatrick in front of a crowd over thirteen hundred at Barmouth FC

The first ever Ardal Northern league cup final was played on May 7th. at Penycae between Caersws and Mold Alex with Caersws scoring the only goal of the game through Glynn Coney

May 2022 Chirk AAA and Mold Alex become the first clubs to win the Ardal Northeast and Ardal Northwest leagues

April 2022 Mold Alex of the Lack Stock Ardal Northwest win the FAW Amatuer Trophy

August 2021 Josh Astley of Llanfair United scored seven goals in an away game at Kerry

The Ardal Northern leagues finally got under  way on July 30th 2021 with Berriew defeating Rhos Aelwyd in the first ever league game

In March 2021 Montgomery Town informed the league that they were resigning from the Ardal North East league. Due to FAW pyramid regulationa an announcment on who would replace them would not be made until June

2020/21 SEASON (The first)
The new Ardal Northern leagues never got going due to the CORVID 19 virus. Various start dates were considered but due to government restrictions due the virus the league was finally cancelled in January 2021

Ardal Northern is sponsored by Lock Stock Self Storage. "Lock Stock have a tradition of supporting local football across North and Mid Wales," said Shon Powell, Director of Lock Stock Self Storage. "We are glad to continue that by sponsoring the new Ardal NW and Ardal NE divisions. This level of football is the base that provides the strength of the game in Wales and as a company that has a presence across the region we know the importance of these clubs to their communities and are proud to continue that support."

On July 28^th. 2020  The FAW announced in that the new leagues would be called The Ardal Leagues with Lock Stock the official sponsors of the Northern leagues which would be knows as the Lock Stock Ardal leagues, the two leagues being the Lock Stock Ardal North East and Lock Stock Ardal North West

As part of the FAW’s “2020 vision and strategic plan for Welsh football”, the FAW committed to the following strategic objective.

“Stronger clubs operating at levels 1 and 2 following a successful restructure of the FAW Pyramid and a greater number of clubs attaining the National Licence.”

A Pyramid Review was established to ensure that the Association addressed this key objective for the domestic game in Wales.

The FAW’s National Game Board (NGB), now the National League board (NLB) established a Working Group to review the Welsh Football Domestic Pyramid structure in September 2014.

Following a review of Tier 1, where it was agreed that no structural changes would be recommended, the Working Group identified one weakness being the magnitude of the step up from Tier 2 to Tier 1 and agreed the following.

-      To implement a standard Tier 2 Ground Criteria for implementation in April 2017 (which was latterly deferred until April 2018). This is aimed at improving facilities at Tier 2 and to reduce the gap between the standard facilities at Tiers 1 and 2

The Working Group then focused on the structure of the Pyramid from Tiers 2 down and developed the terms of reference for a study, which covered some of the following key areas during a series of meetings between April and September 2017:

-       Strengths and limitations of the existing structure

-       Potential new structure

The recommendations of the Working Group were shared with the FAW Community Game Board, National Game Board, International Game Board and the FAW ExCo before being discussed and approved by the FAW Council in October 2017, by a strong majority vote.

The agreed new structure can be seen below

The following was then agreed for the new tier three leagues

• Ground criteria
• Rules

The new tier three leagues would commence in season 2020/21 and clubs had until April 30^th, 2020 to reach the required ground criteria. This was extended to the Coronas virus

The Clubs who applied for the criteria (closing date December 31^st. 2019) and to be considered for the new leagues were:

After a series of applications and interviews by the FAW the officers to administer the leagues on behalf of the FAW were appointed in 2019

A sponsorship deal was agreed with Lock Stock self storage and the two new FAW Northern league would be branded as - Lock Stock Ardal North East and Lock Stock Ardal North West

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