Hawks have unanswered questions as threat to National League season goes on

They have a myriad of unanswered questions regarding their two primary concerns - cash and safety.

On Monday evening, the National League confirmed clubs in all three divisions - the National League, South and North - will vote on what becomes of the pandemic-scarred campaign.

Under company law, they have 28 days to vote - but almost certainly all responses will have been cast by then.

In simple terms, clubs must first vote on whether or not they should group step 1 (the National League) with step 2 (South and North) in a single vote or decide each step’s fate separately.

This resolution needs 75 per cent of the votes to pass. Under the league’s rules, all 23 top flight clubs receive one vote but the South and North divisions only receive eight between them - four for each division.

That means all 23 top flight clubs could vote to group everyone together, but the motion wouldn’t pass if the majority of South and North clubs voted against it as it would need 24 votes to reach a 75 per cent threshold.

But not all 23 top flight clubs might vote; last week the Wrexham Supporters Trust - the club’s owners - said they would abstain from voting as the Dragons, due to the fact they are in Wales, are ineligible for grant help from Sport England’s Winter Survival Package.

All four votes for the South and North divisions have to be cast the same way. If 11 of the 21 clubs vote to pass the resolution, all four of the division’s votes will be ‘for’ and none against even though the voting was as close as it could have been.

Clubs will then be asked whether or not to continue playing - once the two-week suspension ends this coming Friday - or stop with the season then being declared null and void.

If, as expected will be the case, the vote is decided separately then more than 50 per cent of clubs in South and North would need to agree for the season to be ended early for the second year in a row.

It is conceivable that the South division could vote to carry on, but the North might vote to stop immediately. The National League is expected to carry on, as a premature finish would impact on their promotion/relegation with the EFL and on commercial deals such as their television contract with BT Sports.

The voting process has come about due to a number of clubs being concerned over a lack of funding to keep the season going.

Clubs had been expecting a fresh round of grants, similar to what they had in the first three months via the National Lottery, but last month it emerged that only loans would be offered via the Government’s Sport Winter Survival Package.

Hawks director Jeff Hooper attended an online meeting with Sports Minister Nigel Huddleston yesterday morning.

The Minister had previously met with some other National League clubs last Friday.

Hooper was told that all loans will be over 10 years with a two-year payment holiday - not 20 years with a four-year holiday as some clubs had reported. The interest rate will be 2 per cent.

Clubs applying for a loan will have to submit a Cash Flow Forecast, and though there is no official closing date they are advised to get their applications in ASAP as the funds available are not finite.

Hawks will seek more information about the exact detail of available loans before casting their vote, which they are not expected to do for a few days at least.

The club also remain hugely concerned that the subject of mandatory Covid testing was not mentioned in any correspondence from the National League, or in the meeting with Huddleston.

Westleigh Park boss Paul Doswell is a firm advocate of bi-weekly testing - ‘it should be done on a Monday and a Thursday or Tuesday and a Thursday, whenever clubs are in’ he told The News yesterday - but would accept clubs testing once a week.

Previously, the league has left it up to their 66 clubs to determine how often - if at all - they want to test their players.

Inevitably, the vote to either carry on with 2020/21 or to curtail it will be split - it just depends how big the splits are.

Last week, 16 clubs - 12 from the North and four from the South - put their names to a statement calling for the season to be ended no later than this Friday.

Of those 16, not one is currently in the top 10 of either the South and North divisions - meaning all but seven of the clubs in the bottom half of the two tables have gone public in wanting 2020/21 to finish prematurely.

Their words will almost certainly fall on deaf ears, for the time being anyway.

But clubs will still be asked to play games, when the sixth tier suspension is lifted, without any cash having been received in 2021.

Clubs applying for loans have been told it will take around 4/6 weeks before they can expect to receive any cash; this is public money we are talking about and Government agencies do not just hand it out with no questions asked.

Concord Rangers are one of the four South clubs - along with Dulwich, Slough and Chippenham - who called for the league to be curtailed.

And the Canvey Island club’s chairman, Ant Smith, has said his club will NOT be honouring this Saturday’s scheduled game with Hemel Hempstead.

Prior to the two-week suspension, Smith had said his club wouldn’t be honouring a home game against Hawks on January 23 - though the situation was taken out of his hands by Hawks subsequently entering a 10-day self-isolation period.

Smith tweeted yesterday: ‘I can confirm that there are many clubs within the competition that just do not have the funds to continue

‘I have personally written to the league confirming we will not be starting this Saturday.

They need to suspend until clubs have a better understanding of what is on offer!’

It will be interesting to see what the National League tell Concord.

Prior to the suspension, Slough had also said they wouldn’t be sending their team to face Eastbourne in a league game on January 23. In reply, the league ordered them to play - but, again, the matter was then forgotten when a two-week suspension was imposed.

Clubs such as Concord and Slough had been issued with what Smith believed was a ‘threat’ to possibly expel them from the league. By saying his club won’t play Hemel this weekend, he might now receive another one.

Time is also ticking with regards to fitting in all the league games.

At present, the regular league season is due to finish on Saturday, May 29. If it resumes this weekend, that will leave Hawks needing to play 28 league matches in 16 weeks.

Put another way, that’s only two weeks where they wouldn’t have a midweek game - and that’s not taking into account further progress in the FA Trophy!

No club across the National League’s three divisions have played fewer league games than Hawks in 2020/21.