Newcastle United U21

Two clubs that had spent the 1880s competing for the same corner of Tyneside, East End and West End, came together in December 1892. The under-21 group is the current form of that arrangement.

Little Benton, the Darsley Park complex, is where the players train, and the academy there was pushed up to Category One status in 2012 after the Premier League's Elite Player Performance Plan first placed it a rung lower. Matches are played at Whitley Park in North Tyneside, a 1,000-capacity ground that once belonged to West Allotment Celtic, though the fixture list occasionally sends the team to St James' Park itself or across to the Gateshead International Stadium.

What the level has produced matters more than where it plays. The shirt itself has not changed to mark the distinction: black and white stripes, black shorts and socks, the same as every other Newcastle side, and no nickname of its own beyond the one the whole club shares.

Fixtures against Sunderland carry the Tyne-Wear weight even at this level, and Middlesbrough supplies the other fixture the schedule is built around.