Football NSW announced on Thursday the Jets had been accepted into its NPL 4 for seniors and NPL 2 for youth for 2020.

The Jets Youth had been competing in the NNSW state league/NPL since 2012. Their teams had been playing up an age group against local clubs to provide greater competition but they will now take on their own age in the Sydney leagues.

The Jets' departure means the NNSW NPL will drop to 10 teams in seniors and 12 in youth grades. The senior NPL had consisted of 11 clubs for the past three years, creating byes and a 22-round season.

Eland said NNSWF was working on changes but "two rounds of home and away makes the most sense".

"I recall that having a longer season has been discussed before, trying to push it out to two and a half rounds etc, has been discussed, but the two rounds of home and away were definitely a preference, so I'd say that was likely," Eland said. "But it will be up for discussion."

He said the shorter season will alleviate problems with ground availability and hot weather in the early rounds.

"It's made doing the draw extremely difficult, when clubs haven't had their grounds available, so it's a good thing," he said.

"It will provide more flexibility throughout the year as well with having designated rounds for washouts."

He said the Jets joining the NSW NPL was a "a great move" and gave them "access to the most competitive NPL in the country".

The move will also satisfy many among NPL clubs who have felt the Jets' changing line-up had provided inequities for their oppositions.

The Jets have not been eligible to play in finals in recent years but their potential to field A-League-level players at different times had irked rival clubs who had dropped points to them or seen other teams beat weaker Newcastle squads.

Eland agreed the situation had "been a concern" for clubs but said "I think, particularly in recent years, the Jets have been far more consistent, especially since Lawrie [McKinna] has been at the helm.

"He's definitely had a focus on winning games and not just seeing it as more games and development, and the side has been far more settled."

THURSDAY {Robert Dillion reports}: JETS Academy technical director Craig Deans believes Newcastle juniors will benefit "in the long run" from the decision to return to Sydney's top competition, the Football NSW National Premier League.

Football NSW confirmed on Thursday that the Jets had been accepted into the 2020 NPL 4 NSW Men's and 2020 NPL 2 Youth competitions. It has been more than 15 years since Newcastle's juniors last competed in Sydney.

"I think the last group of Newcastle kids who played in the Sydney competition were the age group that produced players like Boogs [Nigel Boogaard], Jobe Wheelhouse and Stuey Musialik," Deans said.

"If you look back to that era, we seemed to be developing some good players.

"We haven't been developing players in the last 10-15 years as we seemed to be back then, so I think the main thing is to get down and be part of some strong competition and really be challenged.

"The competition is just so much stronger because of the number of kids that are playing down there, in comparison to other areas ... time will tell whether it does improve the quality of players."

Deans noted that Newcastle had been fielding teams in the Football NSW women's competitions "for four or five years now" and felt that had helped develop W-League and international players.

He was confident the pressure of promotion-relegation situations each season would also bring out the best in Newcastle's young players.

"That's the appeal for us, that if we're good enough, we can keep getting promoted," he said.