Here are the match-ups for the CCC clubs that have advanced to the Second Round of the Carling Cup. Ties will be played on August 26th and 27th at 7:45 GMT unless otherwise changed.

August 26th 

Burnely v Oldham Athletic (League One)

Cardiff City v MK Dons (League One)

Coventry City v Newcastle United (EPL)

Crewe(League One) v Bristol City

Ipswich Town v Colchester United(League One)

Leeds United(League One) v Crystal Palace

Preston NE v Derby County

QPR v Carlisle United (League One)

Reading v Luton Town (League Two)

Rotherham United (League Two) v Wolves

Southampton v Birmingham

Swansea City v Hull City (EPL)

Watford v Darlington (League Two)

August 27th

Huddersfield Town (League One) v Sheffield Untied

Nottingham Forest v Sunderland (EPL)

Here’s video footage of the relegation battle from the Championship including the demise of Leeds and Southend along with the already-relegated Luton Town (who were top of the table near the beginning of the season).

Today’s 1-0 defeat to Preston North End confirmed Luton Town’s relegation status. Luton had been in the Championship for two seasons after winning League One in the 04-05 season. Newly hired gaffer, former Leeds boss Kevin Blackwell, has to undertake a big rebuilding job over the summer. The club has lost most of their young talents including Carlos Edwards and Curtis Davies.

Climbing into the Championship is Scunthorpe United. The Irons have not been in the second tier of English football for 44 years. Scunthorpe United was formerly known as Scunthorpe and Lindsey United among other names. The club has been in existence since 1899, but did not join the football league until 1950. Their biggest challenge heading into next season will be to retain the services of top scorer Billy Sharp who has netted 28 goals in 42 appearances this season to go along with 23 in 37 last season. Attacking midfielder Andy Keogh has also caught scout’s eyes and he received his first call up to the Republic of Ireland international squad this year.

Luton have fired their manager, Mike Newell, with the club fighting to stay in the Championship. The club dropped to second from bottom in the Championship after losing 2-1 to Hull this past Tuesday. Newell criticised the team’s board after the game and blamed the selling of the club’s best players for their woes.

He was quoted as saying “Where’s the £9m gone? Give that to me and I’ll get five experienced players in, I’ll pay them fortunes and we’ll get ourselves out of it. It takes three or four years to build a reputation as a decent manager and three months to lose that reputation. But if you take the four best players out of any team it will hurt them.”

Since the club won the League One title in 2005, Curtis Davies has been sold to West Brom for £3m, Rowan Vine to Birmingham for £3m, Carlos Edwards to Sunderland for £1.5m and Steve Howard has moved to Derby for £1m.

I feel Newell raised some good points but was probably unwise to express his displeasure to the media. He had also brought a lot of negative press to the club with his comments regarding female assistant referee Amy Rayner. He had put himself in a tenuous position early in the season by going to the FA to say that he had been offered cash by agents and club officials in exchange for selling players.

On top of all that, he had also become embroiled in a public spat with Leeds boss Dennis Wise over former Luton player Kevin Nicholls. Nicholls moved to Leeds last summer in a £700,000 transfer but he has not settled at Elland Road and Newell’s overtures to bring him back led to a war of words between the two managers.

Former Luton player Brian Stein will take temporary charge of the club until a new manager is found.