Co-Chairman Bill Waterson on this evening's big semi-final at The J.Davidson Stadium...

Tonight we welcome the players, staff, officials, and supporters of Leeds United under-21s to The J. Davidson Stadium for the Vanarama National League Cup semi-final.

Leeds have found their way to this stage of the competition by coming second in Group C, behind Newcastle United who we overcame in the Quarter Finals. They started their campaign with a 4-3 win at Boston United, followed by a 2-1 win at Gateshead. A win on penalties at Halifax after a 2-2 draw followed and then a surprise 2-1 defeat at Tamworth in their final group game prevented them from winning the Group. In the Quarter Finals, Leeds came from behind to beat Aldershot in Hampshire.

And to remind you, we reached this stage with a win on pens over Blackburn Rovers after a 3-3 draw, a 4-1 win over Stoke City, a loss at home to an impressive Manchester United side and a 2-1 win over Wolves. This was followed by a win on penalties over Newcastle United after a 3-3 draw.

The other semi-final in this inaugural competition is between Braintree Town and Sutton United which is also being played this evening (kick-off at 7:45pm).

There has been a National League Cup competition before, under a myriad of names – starting life in 1979 as the Alliance Premier League Cup, playing for The Bob Lord Trophy. In 1986 the format changed, as the Northern Premier League, the Southern League and the Isthmian League were also included in what was renamed the GMAC Cup. It had one season as the Clubwise Trophy in 1988, before reverting to the Bob Lord Trophy for a number of years. In 1992 it was known as the Drinkwise Cup and in 1995 the Spalding Cup. The competition was discontinued in 2001.

However, with the creation of the National League North and South Divisions in 2004, the competition was revived. It lasted a season before being shelved again. But two years later, with the arrival of Skrill as the League Sponsors cometh the Setanta Shield. Skrill went into administration in their second season of sponsorship and the competition was mothballed once again at the end of the 2008-09 season.

This season’s competition differs from previous years because of the presence of 16 PL2 U21 sides. With that comes a significant prize pool, funded by the Premier League, which we are doing our level best to claim as much of as possible. Our winnings to date have already surpassed our combined winnings for the FA Cup and the FA Trophy. And make no mistake these funds are particularly useful to us.

One obvious further benefit to the competition is the signing on loan of Charlie Olson from Blackburn Rovers after he captained Rovers to a 3-3 draw at The J.Davidson Stadium in the opening game of the campaign. What a revelation he has been and what a great contribution he has made to our season so far.

And a third major benefit for us was the sell-out for the game against Manchester United U21’s – the 3,663 supporters who attended that night included over six hundred fans who resided in WA14, WA15, M33 and M23 postcodes who had never been to see the Robins before. And since that evening over one hundred have been back for a subsequent game.

Our strategy, as you will have heard me expound on many occasions in recent years, has been to invest in the squad whilst working on growing our revenues. And therefore, regular attendances of over two thousand, unimaginable even five years ago and even three thousand a few times a season is a clear sign that we are making progress. We look like we will achieve an average National League crowd of over two thousand for the fourth consecutive season, having not achieved this feat since the late sixties. This coupled with increased sponsorship, commercial and food and beverage revenues sets a useful context for our continued campaign for promotion to the Football League.

The people of Altrincham and surrounding areas have got behind the club in amazing fashion in recent seasons, and the atmosphere at both home and away games is unrecognisable from even the recent past.

And Phil, Neil and the team have played their part with attractive attacking and successful football. And here we are only 90 minutes away from the final of the National League Cup.

We have of course won the League Cup of the fifth tier before, a two-legged win over Kettering as recently as 1981 putting our name on the Bob Lord Trophy. And of course, the season prior we had lost in a penalty shoot out to Northwich Victoria – but that is irrelevant now!

Enjoy the game.