Page 4 - Deal Round Up January 2020

Who Would Be A Club
Secretary?
By David Richardson

Is anyone else wondering who would be a club secretary in the wake of more clubs falling
foul of the rules when it comes to ineligible players?
There seems to be so much red tape to jump over and areas where you can be tripped
up that some may feel they don’t need the hassle.
Brighouse Town joined Willand Rovers last week as the latest side to be kicked out of
the FA Trophy.
Both clubs fielded a player who didn’t have international clearance, despite having played
for other teams in the National League system before joining them, and were removed
from the competition.
It remains to be seen how far these cases will go – presumably they will have played in
league and other competitions too.
Both clubs felt they had followed the guidelines but that wasn’t enough to prevent them
slipping the wrong side.
And then Bedfont Sports joined the ineligible party.
The Eagles won their initial FA Trophy preliminary
round tie fixture at Grays Athletic 3-0 on October 12
but were charged by football’s governing body for
fielding a playing without international clearance.
It had been suggested that two of the Isthmian
League South Central division’s players didn’t have
the correct clearance to play, but Bedfont provided
the appropriate documents that had been granted by
The FA themselves.
However, it was found that the previous club of one of the players – a team in Romania
– had not applied to the Welsh FA in 2014 for clearance and therefore the chain was not
complete prior to him signing for Bedfont. Consequently, his international clearance from
the FA to Bedfont was cancelled when this was raised four days prior to their first round
qualifying fixture at Hitchin Town.
Having considered the evidence presented by the club, FA members, in accordance with
FA Trophy Rule 16(c), accepted the club did not know and could not have known, even
had they made every reasonable enquiry, that the player was ineligible and should not
be removed from the competition. However, they were still subject to any other penalty
such as being ordered to replay the tie, which took place on Wednesday (November 6).
The feedback we often get is that clubs are finding it harder and harder to attract people
to putting their hand up for the vital jobs that keep Non-League clubs going – and issues
like these aren’t helping.
Volunteers need all the help and encouragement they can get. The game needs to get
together and find some real solutions
Who Are Maldon & Tiptree By Jon Crouch
“MALDON & TIPTREE??” a friend of mine questioned when sifting through the FA Cup
first round fixtures recently. “Who on earth are they?” (or words to that effect).
Queries such as this are actually quite common place for the Non-League Paper news
team, mainly from those who don’t believe in life outside the Premier League.

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