THE York Minster Engineering Football League starts this evening, with Dringhouses defending the premier division title after last season’s successful bid.

After losing four players during the summer break, the St Helens Road-based team will expect a great deal of pressure from last season’s runners-up, Dunnington.

Mick Backhouse, president of Dringhouses, is looking forward to the new season and the testing games ahead.

“We’ve lost a few players since winning the league last season,” said Backhouse. “But we’ve got some young lads coming through that look really promising.

“We fully expect Dunnington to be around the top as they’ve got a really good side together, but I think this season will have a few contenders and it’s going to be difficult.

“Defending the title is a completely different challenge to winning it, but we’ll give it our best shot and, hopefully, we’ll be up there at the end.”

This year will see newly-promoted teams Wigginton Grasshoppers and Rowntrees join the premier division, after both Tadcaster Albion and Kartiers (Selby) withdrew at the end of last season.

The format of the Senior Cup may also need to be reconsidered this year, after last winter’s bad weather meant the final had to be postponed until May.

“I’m not sure whether the cup can be restructured to fit in with the weather,” said Backhouse. “But last season it was so bad we ended up losing eight weeks of cup matches, so maybe it could be looked into.”

The first matches kick-off at 6.30pm tonight, with Dringhouses taking on Hamilton Panthers.