Sideline Help Open Sideline

Get your fixtures in from FA Full-Time

Sideline reads the fixtures page you save from FA Full-Time and adds your games for you. You do not type each game in. Sideline never connects to FA Full-Time itself. It only reads the file you give it.

Before you start

You need the Manage fixtures permission. The club owner can give it to you. Your league must be set up in Sideline, and your teams must be in that league for the current season.

Use a laptop or desktop computer. A phone cannot save the page as a file reliably.

Save the page on FA Full-Time

  1. Go to fulltime.thefa.com. Search for your league and open its Fixtures tab.
  2. In the filters, choose your Club and the Season, then search. Now the page shows only your games. Without the Club filter the file holds every game in the division, and Sideline has to skip the games between other clubs.
  3. Wait until the page has loaded fully.
  4. Save the page.
    • On Windows, press Ctrl + S.
    • On a Mac, press Cmd + S.
  5. Choose Webpage, complete as the type of file.
  6. Save the file where you can find it again.

The save also makes a folder with the same name as the file. Ignore the folder. Sideline only needs the file that ends in .html.

Safari saves a .webarchive file by default, and Sideline cannot read it. Use Chrome, Edge or Firefox. In Safari you can choose Page Source as the format instead.

Upload the page

  1. Select Matchday in the menu, then select Fixtures. Select step 1, Import.
  2. Choose your league under Which league is this page for?
  3. Drop the saved file into the box, or select it and choose the file.
  4. Select Import fixtures.

The next page shows what happened: how many games were added, how many kickoff times changed, and how many games were skipped and why.

If the page looks like a different league from the one you chose, Sideline imports nothing and tells you which league it looks like. It chooses that league for you. Choose the file again and select Import fixtures.

Sideline only reads a file that ends in .html or .htm. For any other file, or a file with no games in it, the message appears beside the file box and nothing is imported.

Match the teams Sideline cannot read

Sideline matches your teams by their exact name on FA Full-Time. If a name is a little different, the game waits in Match teams. A game between two other clubs never appears here.

  1. Open Match teams on the result page. You can also reach it from the Imported games need a team card on the dashboard and on the Fixtures page, and from the Recent imports list.
  2. If Sideline thinks it knows the team, the card asks Did you mean with the team name. Select the button to add the game to that team.
  3. Otherwise, choose Our team and Which name is ours, then select Add this game. The list of teams shows only your teams in that league this season. Select Show all teams to see the rest.
  4. Select Ignore for a game that is not yours. Select Ignore all to set every waiting game aside. You can undo that.

Sideline asks you to confirm when the age in a name, for example U12, does not match the team you chose, for example U13. The card comes back with a The ages are right box. Tick it only when you are sure, then select Add this game again.

If your team already has that game, Sideline does not add it twice. It tells you the game was already there.

Tick Remember this spelling only when the name is always your team. The next import then matches it by itself. Do not tick it for an opponent.

After each choice Sideline tells you what it did, for example "Added U10 Athletic v Lymm Lions on Sat 24 Oct".

Games that have gone from Full-Time

When you import the same league again, Sideline checks the games you already have against the dates on the page. It lists the games that are no longer on the page, or that FA Full-Time shows as postponed or void, under In Sideline but no longer on Full-Time. The Games gone from Full-Time card on the dashboard and on the Fixtures page links to the same list.

Save the page with the Club filter chosen, so that it shows your games in every age group. Then Sideline can tell when a team's only game has gone. A page that shows only one age group cannot do that for your other teams.

For each game you can:

  • Select Postpone or Cancel. Sideline asks why, and tells the team.
  • Select Keep if the game is still going ahead. This is right when you filtered the page to fewer games than before.

If the same team and opponent now play on a different date, the list says so. Select Moved to that date, then postpone the old game. The new date is already in Sideline from the import.

Undo an import

Select Undo this change on the result page. Sideline removes the games the import added and puts back the kickoff times it changed. It also removes the team spellings you saved from that import. It keeps any game that you have put on a pitch, published or played since.

See and remove saved spellings

  1. Select Fixtures, then select Settings.
  2. Select Saved team spellings.
  3. Select Remove next to a spelling that is wrong.

The next import then asks you about the games that used it.

Common questions

Why does Sideline skip some games?

Sideline skips games in the past, games with no date yet, and games between two other clubs. A game is skipped as another club's game when neither team name contains your club's name. It tells you how many it skipped.

Why does a kickoff time show as Time TBC?

FA Full-Time shows 07:00 for a game with no kickoff time yet. Sideline treats that as not set and shows Time TBC. When the league sets a real time, import the page again.

What if a game is postponed on FA Full-Time?

A postponed or void game that is not in Sideline is not added. A game you already have is listed under In Sideline but no longer on Full-Time, so you decide what to do.

Can I import the same page twice?

Yes. Sideline does not add a game twice. It changes the kickoff time of a game you have not put on a pitch, and it tells you about the others.

What if the file is empty or the wrong page?

Sideline says so and imports nothing. Save the page again from FA Full-Time. A page that says "Attention Required" is a "check your browser" page, not your fixtures. Open the fixtures page, wait for it to load, and save it again.