The Championship is to come to a brief pause following a busy period in the fixture schedule. Christmas is now over and so is the time where there's three games packed into such a small period of time in the name of festive football fun. December was a busy month for second tier football in England and now we are a little over the halfway point of the campaign.
League football is your bread and butter and managers are usually judged on their performances in the league but cups can help a little bit. The third round of the FA Cup is here and it's regarded as one of the most exciting days of the football calendar because in some ties, you'll have some clubs who have come a long way from the earlier rounds because of their non-league status playing some of the bigger teams.
West Brom have National League outfit Aldershot Town and it is expected that Carlos Corberan will rotate his side given the small squad that he is currently operating with. Many clubs will give a chance to their fringe players and rest up some of their key personnel as it's been a fairly busy period, and you don't want to play your players too much and risk an injury.
The football calendar is so compact that in some cases competitions have to be held at different points of the year, and throughout the whole of this month there are two international tournaments running side-by-side. The Africa Cup of Nations and Asia Cup are to take place from January 13 to February 11 and January 12 to February 10 respectively.
Several Championship clubs will lose their players this month to international duty, and there is not as much scope for games to be postponed. Some of the 24 teams will be unaffected and none of their players have been called up whilst others will lose a few of their stars.
Here's a full run-through of all 18 Championship men off on international duty.
West Brom have National League outfit Aldershot Town and it is expected that Carlos Corberan will rotate his side given the small squad that he is currently operating with. Many clubs will give a chance to their fringe players and rest up some of their key personnel as it's been a fairly busy period, and you don't want to play your players too much and risk an injury.