City boss welcomes plans for a discussion

EXETER City manager Matt Taylor has welcomed news that the government will discuss the possibility of fans returning to stadiums, but warned they should only be allowed back if it is safe to do so.

Culture secretary Oliver Dowden will address Parliament on October 14 as the effects of coronavirus continue to be felt by clubs up and down the country. Many have called for the safe return of spectators as a matter of urgency with their continued absence having a damaging effect on club finance.

This week, Portsmouth announced they are losing £700,000 per month, due to the pandemic and absence of fans, while Macclesfield Town became the first casualty when they were folded with debts of around £500,000.

The EFL launched a petition this week, asking for fans to return to football grounds at all levels, and it quickly reached 200,000 signatures, easily surpassing the 100,000 required to spark a parliamentary debate.

“We are desperate for them to come back,” Taylor said. “I think it’s fair to say we are not desperate financially for them to come back, because of what’s happened in the last couple of weeks (Exeter received a significant sum of money following Ollie Watkins’ £28 million transfer from Brentford to Aston Villa,) but we are desperate for our fans to be inside the stadium.

“They can only do so if it is safe and that is the overriding factor. If the government don’t think it’s safe, then they won’t allow it.

” You get clusters of areas throughout the country - and all over the country – that are in real peril and struggling in terms of the numbers and we (in Exeter) seem to be going towards that. So the last thing we need is to make the situation worse.

“But we need to be working towards a time frame of when and

if fans can return to stadiums because you hear contrasting reports. A few weeks ago, we were talking about October and then it was six months and then Christmas time and some are even talking about a whole season without fans.

“Like I say, financially we are stable at the moment. But it doesn’t take away the fact that we need the income from fans as well and there are a lot of clubs that are waiting for that to happen to improve their situation.

“Every football fan in the country wants the same thing. But you can only do that in a safe environment.”

Fans have been allowed to attend non-League stadiums from the level below National North and South since the start of the season with volunteers doing everything they can to make it secure and as safe as possible.

With clubs in the Premier League, EFL and National League having more resources, personnel and bigger stadiums to do the same, it beggars the question why amateur clubs can and professional clubs can’t, even if they were to be restricted to a certain number, or a percentage of a club’s ground capacity.

“I suppose we won’t fully know what happens unless fans are back in stadiums,” Taylor added. “You look at the non-League circuit and we had a few people at the Tiverton v Taunton game and that was a busy ground to attend.

“We are trying to make it as safe as possible for fans to return through the turnstiles again and we feel with a bigger stadium and more space we are able to do that.

“But we can only put our proposals in place and push towards what we think is safe and what isn’t safe, but ultimately it is the government’s decision.”