Start to Portsmouth's season brought forward with fixture release date pencilled in

And the Blues are set to find out their league fixtures for the 2020-21 campaign next week.

The Carabao Cup is due to get underway on September 5 - bringing the season’s opening forward one week.

The first game of the EFL season has already been confirmed for September 12.

But there will now be competitive action seven days earlier on the same day as England go to Iceland in the Nations’ League.

The programme has echoes of the 2012-13 season when Pompey travelled to Plymouth in the first round of the same competition, before the league curtain-raiser at home to Bournemouth.

With the club in crisis, Michael Appleton fielded a team with an average age of just 19 in the 3-0 defeat.

And Pompey are expected to find out where they will start the season, with the league fixtures likely to be announced a week on Friday.

The make-up of League One was confirmed last month when Wycombe defeated Oxford United in the play-offs.

Pompey play their first pre-season game this Saturday after going away on a training camp today.

Games are then pencilled in for the following two Saturdays counting down to the Carabao Cup fixture.

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