The Courtyard, Manchester

The Courtyard is a studenty sports bar with a serving counter up the left-hand wall that faces rows of high tables. Across the front is a raised open plan seating area and along the rear wall, behind a supporting wall, are three pool tables. Televisions are located throughout for showing live football, the match hadn’t started when I visited early on a recent midweek evening so some background music was playing off the jukebox. The bar supports standard, premium and craft keg, and food is available. I was going to have the very reasonably priced burger, but a trip to the toilets put me off the idea. Out the back is a large covered courtyard full of picnic tables that are overlooked by a large projector screen. You may be able to catch a match in here that isn’t being shown elsewhere, but that is the only draw.

This is a massive student bar. There's a quiz machine, jukebox and 3 pool tables in the main area. Bare floorboards plus a raised seating area. A large beer garden at the rear is partially covered. Cheap and cheerful food is available, definitely aimed at students. 3 handpumps on the bar, two for real ale and one for real cider. Sadly only one of the ale ones was in use on my visit which was pulling Artisan Amarillo which was a very good pint. Not really my kind of place, but it does sell decent beer. I expect it's rammed at weekends.

A very studenty place. Open plan with the bar to your left. A few tv screens of which a couple had Fifa/Uefa video games for the dullards to play (wisely nobody seemed to be playing as a British team). Real ale is available. A large outside area to the rear. Its not great but its there.

Official site of The Courtyard - www.courtyardmanchester.co.uk

Official site of The Courtyard - www.courtyardmanchester.co.uk