Windsor boss says restructure would bring club costs down
Windsor manager Mark Cooper believes the FA still plans to implement a major league restructure at their level of the nonleague game this summer, and if they do he’s hopeful it will help with the considerable costs of running the football club.
The FA’s intention is to create a new Thames Valley Premier League for clubs like Windsor, Burnham and Flackwell Heath to play in and last year the association said that whatever happened with the coronavirus pandemic this season, it would still take place in 2021.
Cooper hopes this is still the case and points to the crippling cost for clubs in step 5 putting on coaches for half of their away games and travelling big distances to play matches against the likes of Westfield and Bishops Cleeve.
“The FA have spoken about the restricting of leagues at our level so that clubs don’t get the travel they’ve been getting in recent years,” he said. “In the Hellenic League we’ve been going to Westfield and Bishops Cleeve. The cost of that is crippling to clubs when the income at our level is so minimal. Putting on coaches for half of your away games doesn’t help clubs at our level to be self-sustainable.
“There’s talk of there being a Thames Valley Premier League. It would see us play teams that are more in our region, rather than travelling to Gloucestershire and other areas.
“The hope is they’ll do that this summer. They said last year that regardless of what happened this season, that was the plan. If they go ahead with that it will be much better for us. There would be a lot more local games, which is what everyone wants.”
For now, Cooper is just focused on getting the boys back for training again at the end of March.
“Hopefully, we’re four weeks away from getting together as a group again, then there would be two weeks of intensive training, if this competition was to go ahead,” he said.
“If that is done by the end of May, you’ll then have a short off-season, a month or so off, before we come back again.
“It has been testing, but at the same time you can only work within the framework you’ve been given. Everyone is in the same boat and we just have to work on that. We can’t get together but there’s still plenty of chat on the group and everyone is looking forward to getting back as soon as possible. It will be nice to go back in the long summer evenings and get some competitive football in.”
Slough Town are still waiting to hear if they’re going to be sanctioned for refusing to play National League South fixtures while they awaited the outcome of the vote which led to the campaign being cancelled.
The Rebels were always confident enough clubs would vote to end the season and null and void the results so, to save themselves the loss of further income, they opted not to play a number of fixtures while clubs deliberated on how to vote.
The club were officially charged by the league for that failure to play matches, however, sanctions for those clubs that refused to play were never discussed.
Slough repeatedly called for the season to be called off because of COVID-19 safety concerns and the funding issues which emerged when it became clear the Government wasn’t willing to come up with further grant support for clubs to continue playing matches without fans.
“We don’t know what’s happening,” said Baker.
“We haven’t heard. I think clubs will probably get a warning. That’s what my gut says.
“I think it was meant to be reviewed on February 25 but my gut feeling is that no charges will be brought except for potentially a warning, which is fine.
“Everyone in the industry knows that clubs weren’t in a position to really carry on.”
Baker added that he had no problem with clubs In the North and South division who wanted to continue playing banding together to continue with a season of sorts, but he doesn’t expect it will happen.
He added: “The 18 clubs that want to continue, and if they get the go-ahead to continue, my guess is that probably only 13 or 14 of them would play.
“I don’t think it will happen. If it does, it’s great for them, but my gut is that it won’t happen.”