End Now, It's The Only Way

Winners And Losers: Tim’s club Hayes & Yeading could lose out if the season doesn’t restart

I am writing this on Thursday and the earliest you will read this is Sunday, so apologies if by now it’s all out of date, but that’s the main crux of my argument anyway. Things are moving fast around the globe in this health crisis and football needs to react at the same speed.

Non-League football has been halted by the pandemic of Covid-19. The season’s been suspended but we need to be realistic and draw a line in the sand now.

Realistically, things on every level are going to get worse before they get better which means that, should all this pass in the blink of an eye, we would have lost at least six weeks of the season at the most critical time. I hear ‘pundits’ say football can simply start again in May or June now because the Euros have been postponed? Nice sentiment but in reality it’s a dream only.

By then most contracted players will be out of contract – most clubs run 40-week contracts – so who will they be committed to? If travel is back on the agenda, most will already have holidays booked in the very short close season window they have before pre-season begins. Remember, football probably isn’t their only job.

If the season restarts, we are already looking at players having to play three, maybe four, even five games per week. It’s not easy at the best of times to ask your employer for an early finish twice per week to get to your ‘footballing job’, but with a downturn in business why should football expect that business owner to suffer even further?

Noose