With only the opening weekend of televised dates picked off – Leeds United in particular can expect to be on Sky a lot in 2023-24 – and more interference guaranteed from cup draws, weather and even international football, there is only so much you can learn from publishing a list of games in late June.

Even so, just seeing the order of names and thinking about the challenges to come can send a tingle down many a fans' spine.

The excitement comes in many forms.

Neither club is back for pre-season training yet and already Doncaster Rovers and have eight potential debutants for the August 5 visit of Harrogate Town, who made their sixth signing on Thursday evening.

At Huddersfield Town and Hull City, familiarity is stoking the feel-good factor. Neil Warnock is back in West Yorkshire by popular demand and on the east coast, new frozen and cut-price memberships have been selling rapidly as a vote of confidence that coach Liam Rosenior is building something worth being part of. Matt Taylor and Mark Hughes are trying to do similar at Championship Rotherham United and League Two Bradford City respectively.

For Leeds and Sheffield Wednesday, the questions are about who and what they will watch in their curtain-raisers, with both managerless at the time of going to press. As Michael Duff looking increasingly likely to take charge at Swansea City, Barnsley are bracing themselves to fall into the same boat.

The deeper television gets its claws in – from 2024-25 there will be 10 live Football League games shown most weekends – the less actual dates mean, but it still gives a feel and a flavour for how things will pan out.

RIVALRY RESUMED: Leeds United and Sheffield Wednesday will clash again for the first time in three years

That Wednesday and Leeds kick off the Football League’s TV coverage despite their uncertainties is welcome validations for two clubs with justifiably high opinions of themselves.

The Owls host Southampton, like Leeds relegated from the Premier League, in the kind of fixture they pined for in two years of League One exile. The Whites resume a rivalry that has flared in the 21st Century.

With 14 league defeats and only three wins in the 22 meetings since being infamously dumped out of the FA Cup in the 2001-02 FA Cup, Leeds could do without facing Cardiff City whilst they are still getting their ducks in a row but at least it is at Elland Road, where they won January's FA Cup replay convincingly.

Six Yorkshire clubs make second-tier derbies easy to find.

GROUNDS FOR OPTIMISM: Neil Warnock and his assistant manager Ronnie Jepson are back at Huddersfield Town - with plenty of former clubs to visit

Wednesday are at Hull on the second weekend and Leeds on the fifth. The Whites are in East Yorkshire for the first floodlit round of league games on September 20.

Warnock will have ticked off three former clubs by mid-September, starting at Plymouth Argyle, heading to Middlesbrough on August 19 and welcoming Rotherham for the first game after the opening international break.

When the Terriers are at Elland Road in the last weekend of October, Wednesday and Rotherham will be resuming rivalries at S6. The return fixtures are due to kick off March.

If neither side knows their fate by then – and it is an if – Leeds's final-day visit from Southampton has the potential to be a humdinger. Ditto Rotherham v Cardiff should they find themselves in another relegation battle, or the Owls' trip to Sunderland if their seasons go to plan.

STABILITY: Hull City and Rotherham United are not troubled by the uncertainties of some of their local rivals

Leeds face some onerous travel with Swansea City and Plymouth Argyle in the same February week, and Sunderland and Stoke City are both evening kick-offs.

Starting at Norwich and finishing at Southampton means Hull at least get those long trips out of the way on afternoons with light nights. The Owls have their Welsh trips plus Plymouth ticked off before the clocks go back but they and Middlesbrough face Norfolk nights at Norwich’s Carrow Road.

The addition of Wrexham and Notts County adds real interest to what should be a fascinating League Two Doncaster and Bradford ought to be in the thick of. They will have to wait until mid-winter to lock horns, at the Eco-Power Stadium on the last Saturday before Christmas and the return as soon as January 20.

Harrogate make their first trip to Stadium MK on September 30.

Bradford face Phil Parkinson's Wrexham in October (21st, home) and February (10th, away).

This will be Barnsley’s first season in 30 without a Yorkshire league derby, alone in League One. Finishing August against Peterborough United, Oxford United and Wigan Athletic should give a good idea of where to set their hopes.

Thinking about 2023-24 can start in earnest. It all gets going again on the first weekend of August.

Televised openers and derbies galore should keep Yorkshire in spotlight next season