Cooper sees no other alternative but to null and void the Hellenic League season

Bill Montague

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Mark Cooper admits he sees no other alternative than declaring the Hellenic League season null and void and, with so few matches having been played, the Windsor boss believes it certainly shouldn’t be decided on points-per-game.

Cooper expects the outcome of non-league football to be decided by the FA after the Government reviews the national lockdown in mid-February. If grassroots football is given the green light to resume, clubs at steps 3 to 6 will most likely have until May to complete their season.

“It’s a bit of a waiting game right now and I guess we won’t know [if football can resume] until mid-February,” he said.

“To be honest, I don’t see any other alternative to just null and voiding the season. One of the alternatives that were spoken about was amalgamating the aggregate point totals from this season and the last. But I don’t see how you can do that when you’ve officially declared last season null and void.

“That’s not really a workable option and of course you can’t do points-per-game with such few games being played this season. Right now, I don’t really see another real alternative.”

If this season is to be declared null and void, Cooper is hopeful the Hellenic League can come up with some methods to keep its clubs fit until the next campaign begins later this year.

“I think what potentially should be happening in the background is that the league should have a suite of options if the season was to end prematurely,” added Cooper.

“For example, if we go back on March 1, they could put on a competition of 12 games in a local league.

“You can think of plenty of different options but they will be dictated by when football is allowed to be played again. If we’re not allowed back until April, I believe the FA have only given us until the end of May to complete anything we want to complete.

“We simply have no idea what the short to medium term outlook is and we will just have to deal with what’s put in front of us in due course. Everything is up in the air until we get some clarity from the league and from the FA.”