Reply With QuoteSad news, the club have made the right decision.
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Two more of our players have tested positive for Covid-19 and as a result we have withdrawn from the Emirates FA Cup and postponed our upcoming Vanarama National League matches away to FC Halifax Town and Aldershot Town.
After four members of our squad tested positive for the virus last week, we scheduled another round of testing this Wednesday to identify any further infections.
Unfortunately this has resulted in two more positive results and, following consultation with the FA and National League’s medical officers, we have taken the difficult but responsible decision not to travel to King’s Lynn Town on Saturday and to temporarily halt our league campaign.
King’s Lynn will be awarded a bye to the first round and our trips to Halifax and Aldershot will be rearranged for later in the season. We would like to thank each club for their cooperation and understanding.
Our chief executive Jason Turner said: “Our thoughts are with the players affected by the virus, who are all receiving the best possible care and support to ensure they return to us safe and well.
“Naturally, we are incredibly disappointed to withdraw from the FA Cup – a competition, as past winners, we have a wonderful association with – but with only 14 available players and several positions we’re now unable to cover, on top of the clear risk of more infections coming to light in the coming days, it is only right that we take decisive action to cease training and playing for the time being.
“I am hugely proud of the way the club has conducted itself throughout the pandemic and would once again like to pay tribute to our owners, Chris and Alex Reedtz, for continuing to fund regular testing despite this not being mandatory, thus ensuring we are doing all we can to protect our players, staff and the wider public.
“Chris and Alex’s diligence has drawn huge praise from the authorities and allowed us to take informed decisions since the outbreak in March. With some of our infected players not displaying symptoms, our efforts have probably prevented us from unknowingly and irresponsibly spreading the virus to any of our aforementioned opponents.
“With no matches now scheduled until our home fixture against Stockport County on Wednesday 11 November, our focus is on minimising a further outbreak within the club, devising a return-to-play protocol for our affected players and helping our fit players maintain their conditioning remotely to ensure we’re ready to continue our strong start to the season next month.”
Our manager, Neal Ardley, added: “While I’m devastated that I won’t have the opportunity to put together a cup run for the club this season, the safety of my players, staff, the opposition and their families have to be the priority at this terrible time.
“As we’re all aware, it’s taken some people many months to recover from this illness and we therefore need to tread very carefully when it comes to rehabilitating our affected players.
“This is a new situation for everyone and I’m in close dialogue with our medical department to ensure we have careful and considered procedures in place.
“I’m hugely proud to represent a club that cares so strongly about its employees and community and I would like to join Jason in thanking our owners for their unwavering commitment to our safety.”
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Sad news, the club have made the right decision.
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This news sucks, but it felt inevitable once we got the four positive tests last Friday.
Really bad luck with the timing, and now we're going to be playing catch-up with the next two league games off.
Hopefully we'll be able to reschedule at least one of the games in November as it looks like we have free midweeks on Nov. 17/24 (I assume we'll have to keep one free in case of an FA Trophy replay - though if ever there was a season to go out at the first round stage, it's this one).
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Far more than the league, the FA Cup seems a bit pointless without fans, though I’m sure the club will be disappointed to miss out on the prize money.
All the best to the players involved, I hope no more of them get infected.
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Can’t see this season completing
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Assuming we won't be the last club forced to withdraw, the cup competitions are going to become a complete farce this year.
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Agreed, let's hope they are mild cases and the infection is contained - though if two tested positive yesterday, you fear there could still be more to come. At least we've now got nearly three weeks till the next scheduled game - though it means we'll need another mini pre-season after a couple of weeks without proper training.Originally Posted by BigFatPie
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Can’t see this season completing
So can I.
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Almost feels like we are being punished for doing the right thing and undertaking regular testing at our own expense when our players may have caught the virus from other clubs' players who didn't bother or couldn't afford to do the testing
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You would hope that part of the deal for the funding all National Leagues are receiving would be on the condition that the clubs arrange Covid testing for all the squad & staff.
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