Freebie Friday: What do you do now the season only has a few days left?

The business is almost complete, share with us what the summer means for you

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What do you do when the season finishes for your club? Is it feet up time and enjoy the summer? Is it getting all the dates together for the important things like fixture release time and pre-season friendlies as and when they are announced? Or do you feed on every single snippet of information and rumour until it’s time to go again?

We’re certainly in the wind down section of the 2022-23 season as the play-off’s reach their conclusion within the next two weeks, once the FA Trophy and Vase games are completed at Wembley on Sunday 21^st May, that fully signals the end of the non-league season.

Of course there is the excitement or disappointment that began in the last few days of clubs releasing their retained lists and social media posts of players announcing they’re leaving, for some sparking a race for their signature. It doesn’t stop the speculation for those interesting other clubs despite being under contract, that’s the nature of the game.

Some turn their attention to the summer sports, cricket the main one to overlap the football season at both ends of the year, fully in focus now the football has finished for some, rest and relaxation and the mind getting a breather until it’s time to go again.

Many will have the date for the new season already set in stone along with the week the fixtures are released, the lower down you are the longer you have to wait after including the varying factors of those above to avoid and finally you can start planning.

A constant check of the club’s social media accounts and website, waiting for that next pre-season announcement or new signing coming your way, additional work happening around the club, it’s small, it’s a snippet but it keeps you going until the next one.

Having had a few years of the season not finishing until we have been into June, returning the end to May gives a proper break for all, remember we’re all human beings and not robots set to complete 90 minutes every week, not everyone has football as a sole focus but a distraction no doubt.

For those in the lower reaches the FA competition draws become known before the league fixtures are common knowledge, with so many clubs wanting to play in the Vase and Cup these days the start date gets earlier and earlier.

League Cup draws for those clubs too are likely to be known early summer, and  another snippet to come your way.

I saw you nod as you read through, ‘yep that’s me’, possibly more than once or ‘do I do that, I think I do’, don’t worry this close season part is getting shorter and shorter every year.

Me, well there’s still plenty to write about. Clubs change managers, owners step down, clubs fall into trouble, others sometimes benefit from that and there is always something going on, non-league football is vast, personal lives cause football issues and provide a story, happy but also sometimes unfortunate.

I can call on my bank of contacts to find out how they saw the season last, what they’re looking for next year, managers out of the game and desperate to get back in, there are people everywhere in the game wanting to be in the limelight to remind others they are still there.

The fact the Non League Paper continues through the summer while its sister edition the Football League Paper has a summer hiatus tells you lot, blink and you’ll miss something even while the grass is busy growing in preparation for another season, there’s a story every week, sometimes several in a day.

I’d love to hear from you if there are any topics you want to read about, something going on in your club and you want a view on it, it’s all possible and opinion is never right or wrong, it’s your unique take and thought on it.

Feel free to hit the comments and stick some ideas in there, there’s never a bad one and I’ll include as many as I can.