The National Youth League (NYL) is the premier competition for youth football players in

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

. Founded in 2003, it was a league competition consisting of the youth teams of each of the ten clubs that played in the New Zealand Football Championship. It was held each season between October and December, and consists of each team playing each other once; the fixture list mirrors that of the senior league. The last team to be champions of the original league and the most successful team of the competition was the youth team of Auckland City, finishing champions seven times in the sixteen years the original competition ran. In December 2021, New Zealand Football announced that they were bringing back the National Youth Development League to run alongside the

National League The National League of Professional Baseball Clubs, known simply as the National League (NL), is the older of two leagues constituting Major League Baseball (MLB) in the United States and Canada, and the world's oldest extant professional team ...

. The Competition will see eight teams from 3 qualifying leagues play-off in a knockout style tournament. Three teams qualify from the Northern League, three qualify from the

Central League The or is one of the two professional baseball leagues that constitute Nippon Professional Baseball in Japan. The winner of the league championship plays against the winner of the Pacific League in the annual Japan Series. It currently consi ...

and two qualify from the Southern League. The regional leagues will run from August through to late September. The finals series will take place at a neutral location in October and will see all eight teams play 3 games in a knockout style competition. Auckland United are the defending champions after winning the 2022 edition.

History

The first National Youth League was founded in 2003, with eight teams representing different regional football federations in New Zealand, playing each other once; the inaugural champions were Capital Soccer. In 2007, the competition changed from teams representing federations to teams representing each club in the New Zealand Football Championship. The youth squad of Auckland City won the first season of this new format, and have since become the most successful team in the competition, winning six titles. In 2008, the competition used a ten-team, two-group format, with the top two teams from each group heading into a playoff system;

Waitakere United Waitakere United was a football club based in Waitakere City, New Zealand. They were one of the franchises in the ISPS Handa Premiership. They played their home games at Fred Taylor Park in Kumeu and The Trusts Arena. History Waitakere Uni ...

won in the final against

Canterbury United Canterbury United Dragons are a semi-professional football club from Christchurch, New Zealand. The team plays most of its matches at English Park in Christchurch, though they occasionally play in Nelson. The club last played in the ISPS Handa ...

. However, in 2009, only four teams participated due to funding issues ( Auckland City,

, Auckland-Manukau and

Hawke's Bay United Hawke's Bay United was a professional Association football club based in Napier, New Zealand. HB United most recently played in the ISPS Handa Premiership – a semi-professional franchise based league, which ran independently of the winte ...

); the league moved to nine teams in late 2010 following the league's rebrand to the ASB Premiership, still following the two-group format. The 2013 season introduced two more teams to make a twelve-team, two-group league, but in 2014 the format was amended to mirror the New Zealand Football Championship; each league team fielded a youth team in the National Youth league, with the competitions returning to its one-group format. In the 2016 season, mirroring the club movements of the New Zealand Football Championship,

Hamilton Wanderers Hamilton Wanderers Association Football Club is a semi-professional Association football club from Hamilton, New Zealand, that currently competes in the Northern League. National League Hamilton Wanderers joined the New Zealand Football Champ ...

replaced the outgoing WaiBOP United and both newly founded teams Tasman United and

Eastern Suburbs Eastern Suburbs may refer to: Places *Eastern Suburbs (Mumbai), India *Eastern Suburbs (Sydney), Australia **Eastern Suburbs railway line, Sydney, Australia Sports clubs ;Association football *Eastern Suburbs AFC, Auckland, New Zealand * Eastern ...

fielded sides in the competition. Surprisingly, Hamilton Wanderers won the title at their first attempt under the leadership of first-team players Michael Built and Adam Luque. After a review by New Zealand Football of all their national competitions, it was decided to end the national youth competition. Instead each

club Club may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media * ''Club'' (magazine) * Club, a '' Yie Ar Kung-Fu'' character * Clubs (suit), a suit of playing cards * Club music * "Club", by Kelsea Ballerini from the album ''kelsea'' Brands and enterprises ...

from the New Zealand Football Championship will have to register 40 players, of which 17 of them have to be aged 21 or under. They will also work with the local

federations A federation (also known as a federal state) is a political entity characterized by a union of partially self-governing provinces, states, or other regions under a central federal government ( federalism). In a federation, the self-governi ...

the clubs are assigned with, to run a development team in the regional leagues. In the last season of the old competition, Auckland City won its seventh title as well as winning three in a row from 2017 to 2019 to finish as Champions of the competition. In 2021, New Zealand Football announced the reintroduction of the National Youth League as an U-17 competition that will run alongside the

Current teams

Former teams

Champions

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Team Wellington Team Wellington Football Club was a New Zealand semi-professional football club based in the suburb of Miramar in Wellington, New Zealand. They competed in the ISPS Handa Premiership. Team Wellington had traditionally been one of the most succe ...

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References

{{Association football in New Zealand, state=collapsed Association football leagues in New Zealand Youth football competitions