The Under-18 Men's leagues have undergone another large expansion, with 93 teams accepted for membership, compared with the 70 which finished last season.

The biggest change comes in the Premier Divisions, where an expansion from 23 to 38 teams has resulted in an increase from two divisions (North and South) to four.

Seventeen of last year's 23 teams remain in the Premier divisions, which means that over half have either been promoted from the Conferences or are completely new entrants.

Three teams from the Premier League, however, are not competing at Under-18 level this season - Barrow Thorns, London Utd Hillingdon Slough and St Peters Solihull.

The most surprising of these is Barrow, who finished as runners-up in the Northern premier, and took third place in the RAF Final Four. However, they have entered senior EBL Division 4 next season, and so their older players will undoubtedly be playing there, while their Under-16s could only finish sixth in the North-West Conference, so they are probably concentrating their youth development efforts at that age-group.

In the North Premier Division, the promoted teams are the North-West Conference Champions and Runners-up, and (assuming that Newcastle East is the new name for Benfield, the development team for Newcastle Eagles) the North-East Conference Champions (who also reached the semi-finals of the Sureshot Cup!).

The complete newcomers in this division are Northants Moulton, who, I imagine, are based at Moulton College, and who, I believe, have links with the existing Northants club (which will be why they find themselves with many a long journey in the North section, to separate them from Northants Thunder in the Midlands).

The Premier newcomers in the Midlands include last year's Midlands Conference Runners-up, and the Champions and Runners-up of the Under-16 Midlands Conference.

Leicester Beauchamp Cannons are also new to the Under-18 Premier division, and in fact withdrew from the Midlands Conference after just one game last season. However, their Under-16s finished third in the strong U-16 Premier North, and so they should prove competitive at Under-18 this year.

The complete newcomers in this division are TeamSpirit Hallam Junior Sharks, as the size and quality of their development programme enables them to run two teams of Premier division standard.

Aston Athletics are also technically a new name in the competition, but last year they did have a link-up with City of Birmingham, who are still there under their own name.

The South-East looks particularly strong this year, with five teams having experienced Premier Under-18 competition last year, including the reigning Final Four Champions, East London Royals.

The Southern Conference Champions and Runners-up join the Premier Division, and so do the team that finished fourth in that Conference ... despite the fact that they finished the season with three games unplayed! Another surprise inclusion is Brentwood Fire, who finished last in the South-East Conference (and who had two games outstanding at the end of the season), but who finished fourth in the Under-16 South Conference.

Both Brixton Topcats (South-East Conference Champions) and Baddow Eagles (South-East Conference eunners-up) have also now been promoted to the South-East Premier.

The Western Conference Champions and Runners-up both join the South-West Premier, and so do the Under-16 South Conference Champions and the Under-16 Premier South Runners-up.

The surprise in the division is the inclusion of Gloster Jets, who finished a lowly sixth in the Western Conference last year - and whose Under-16 team failed to win a game in the Premier South!