‘Finishing the season to me looks an impossibility’ – Gosport Borough boss Shaun Gale

‘Finishing the season to me looks an impossibility.’
Gosport Borough boss Shaun GaleGosport Borough boss Shaun Gale
Gosport Borough boss Shaun Gale

That’s the view of Gosport Borough boss Shaun Gale as the pause button continues to be pressed on the 2020/21 Southern League campaign.

The league have said games are ‘unlikely’ to restart before Saturday, January 9 - and that was before the new tier 4 restrictions were announced at the weekend.

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Moneyfields chairman Pete Seiden told The News yesterday that he believes the Southern League season should be ‘binned’ now.

Moneys have only played four Division 1 South games so far since the season started 14 weeks ago.

Gosport, in the Premier South division, have only played seven - the last a 1-0 loss at Poole Town on October 27, almost two months ago.

Asked if he could see the season reaching its natural conclusion, he replied: ‘No, I can’t see how they can finish it fairly.

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‘Clubs don’t have big enough squads - there’s no income coming in.

‘We still have bills to pay, but there’s no financial help.

‘It’s crippling football clubs.

‘I can’t see us kicking a ball before February if we’re lucky.

‘It’s not feasible to finish the season then. You can’t ask players to play three times a week, it’s physically impossible.

‘They’ve got jobs to do, some might be up at 5am to work on building sites.

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‘You couldn’t do it at the top level, so you certainly couldn’t do it at ours.

‘Finishing the season to me looks an impossibility.

‘You can’t really run it over to next season, and you can’t play most of the summer and then start again in August, that’s not going to work either.’

The former Hawks boss added: ‘It’s frustrating for everyone.

‘I don’t want to be seen to be moaning because I know there are people dying all over the world, I understand that.

‘There’s no real guidance, that’s what frustrates me.

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‘I don’t know what they could do. There’s been talk of splitting the leagues, playing just local games.

‘They have to do something soon, they can’t just keep on throwing it back to the clubs to vote on because you’re going to get a split opinion.

‘We voted to carry on playing but 76 per cent didn’t - I don’t know why they didn’t, surely you want to play?

‘We’ve looked at friendlies but some clubs don’t want to play because their players are on furlough.

‘The whole thing is a bit of a shambles.

‘The biggest thing is not knowing, we just need some clarity.

‘We need the league to say ‘ok, this is what we’re going to do.’