Football league trophy draw

Stoke have been drawn in northern group C with Bradford, Morecambe and Bury as part of the revamped Football league Trophy. From this season the League 1 and 2 clubs are joined by leading Academies from the Premiership and Championship, which includes Stoke. We will field an under 23’s team and have won this trophy back in 1992 and 2000.

Originally, 15 Premier League teams, along with Newcastle in the Championship, were invited to include Academy sides in the competition. However Arsenal, Liverpool, Man City, Man Utd, Newcastle and Tottenham have rejected the offers and been replaced by Blackburn, Brighton, Derby, Norwich, Reading and Wolves.

The first round will involve 16 groups of four teams organised on a regional basis, with each group including at least one club from each of League One and League Two. Teams will play each other once, either at home or away, with a penalty shoot-out in the event of a draw. The final will be at Wembley Stadium on Sunday April 2.

Choulay/Moha was involved in QPR’s friendly with Burton Albion last night and was listed as a trialist with a view to a possible loan move to QPR. Stoke signed him from Barcelona last summer although he has not made a first team appearance to date.

Julien N’Goy (who earned rave reviews for his performance against Preston at the weekend), Ollie Shenton , goalkeeper Daniel Gyollai, Joel Taylor, Eddy Lecygne and George Waring have all travelled with the first team squad to Orlando.