Why the alarm bells should have been ringing for the National League season in mid-November

As first reported last night, there is now grave doubt over whether the 2020/21 seasons in the top two tiers of non-league football will be completed.

Clubs across the three divisions - the National League, South and North - are adamant they cannot carry on playing if their next few cash handouts are in the shape of loans rather than grants.

For the first three months of the season - October, November and December - the 66 clubs received around £10m in grants via the National Lottery fund.

The presumption - never put in writing anywhere - was that similar grants would be available after Christmas if games were still being played behind closed doors.

But the goalposts were moved in November when the National League funding was diverted from the Lottery to the Sport Winter Survival Package, a £300m fund covering 11 sports.

All of a sudden, National League clubs were being grouped in with the likes of badminton, ice hockey and even greyhound racing. Compared to the 66 National League clubs, there are only 19 stadiums registered with the Greyhound Board of Great Britain - 18 of which are in England. But now they were going head to head for cash to help them through the pandemic.

On the day the funding was announced, November 19, the Government said the £300m funding ‘will be largely composed of loans.’ For once, the devil was not in the detail - the devil had already been revealed.

That should have set the alarm bells ringing loudly, but there was a feeling among some National League clubs that they had nothing to worry about.

After all, they had been ‘promised’ similar free cash to see them through January, February and March.

If any clubs did think that way, they have been proved wrong. Very wrong.

It is believed that ‘only’ £50m of the £300m fund is available in grants. The rest is made up of loans.

With that in mind, what chance did the National League have of receiving over one-fifth of that £50m grant sum all for themselves?

Lest we forget, rugby union, rugby league, horseracing, motorsport, tennis, netball and basketball were also included in the Survival Package. And that to the equation, and why did National League clubs believe they would in any way have grant money ‘ring-fenced’ for them?

Yes, they are ‘elite’ level sport, but so are most of the others included in the Survival Package.

The National League fallout could be swift, and it could be brutal.

Hawks CEO Stuart Munro said on Monday: ‘As a football club, we aren't in a position to take loans as I think many of our fellow clubs, particularly in the National South, won't be either.

‘Those first three months of grants were given on the basis that it would be reviewed for the following three months of January, February and March.

‘It would now seem that if they continue with it being a loan we won't finish the season ... there's a real doubt whether the National League will continue to its completion.’

Kerry Underwood, vice chairman of Hawks’ divisional rivals Hemel Hempstead, agrees.

‘Loans have to be paid back and non-league football generally is pretty much hand to mouth most of the time,’ he remarked.

“It’s the worst of both worlds in the sense that if the money simply isn’t there then you can’t pay the players and referees and the danger of a loan is that it’s there and you spend the money.

“But for most clubs there’s no way you can get half a season’s lost revenue back and repay a loan.

‘I would stop the National League now and just make the best of a bad job and really put the effort into making next season a fantastic one.’

The seeds of a scenario now teetering on the brink of descending into a total shambles were sown last autumn.

The National League, which usually begins in early August, delayed its start until early October for one big reason - to ensure some fans could attend matches. Under Government guidelines, they were due back across the country on October 1.

Clubs in the EFL had begun playing competitive games on the first Saturday of September with the Southern League - the next tier down from National League South - starting on September 19.

NL clubs had spent thousands - that they didn’t have, with no income since the previous March - on making their grounds Covid-safe for October 1.

Hawks, following talks with their local Safety Advisory Group, were anticipating being allowed a maximum of 1,411 fans into home games under socially distanced guidelines.

Then, on September 22 - with only a fortnight to the opening round of National League games on Tuesday, October 6 - the Government dropped a bombshell.

Reacting to the rise in Covid infection rates, Prime Minister Boris Johnson pressed the pause button regarding the return of crowds to ‘elite’ stadia.

It is interesting to look back at the figures which prompted that decision.

Covid-19 case numbers had plummeted from an average of nearly 5,000 per day in April and May to under 1,000 by late June.

Numbers began to climb again, however, in August. By the end of the month, the seven day average of new cases had risen to 1,322. As of September 21, that average had nearly quadrupled to 4,368.

They have continued to rise - and rise and rise.

On January 3 this year, 54,990 new cases were reported - the sixth day in a row the figure had topped 50,000. Two days later, 60,916 - the highest in the UK to date - were announced.

Returning to late September, and the fact the National League season would start behind closed doors resulted in £10m of Lottery funding quickly being made available to clubs.

However, when the season kicked off, clubs still had no idea how much they would be receiving. That in itself was a farce.

It wasn’t until October 21 - Hawks had played four competitive games by then - that they found out.

Grants varied, from the £95,000 a month paid to Chesterfield, Hartlepool, Notts County, Stockport, Torquay, Wrexham and Yeovil to the £30,000 banked by 38 clubs, including Hawks.

Overall, the 43 South and North clubs received an average of £92,000 - £168,000 per club less than their National League cousins.

Some were unhappy, some no doubt delighted. Some of those unhappy went public with their complaints.

Who knows if their anger was relayed to anyone in Government who subsequently took a dim view of clubs complaining about receiving free money?

There is, meanwhile, a bleak irony in the decision to offer National League clubs loans rather than grants.

If clubs decide not to play and instead furlough their staff, including players, until the end of April it will almost certainly cost the Government more than the £11m in grants it would have taken to ensure the season progressed.

A figure of £14m across all three National League divisions has been mentioned.

That is obviously a farce, but one the Government almost certainly won’t have taken into consideration.

The Treasury will have signed off the £300m Sport Winter Survival Package and passed it onto the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCSM) for distribution via the Sport England umbrella.

The Whitehall department responsible for paying 80 per cent of the salaries of people on furlough won’t have had any communication with the DCMS.

That is why we could end up with a ridiculous situation costing the taxpayer MORE money for clubs to NOT play games than it would for them carry on as normal.

The furlough system put in place by Chancellor Rishi Sunak is due to finish at the end of April. Originally due to end this month, it was extended before Christmas. It could obviously still be extended again.

But at present, the National League season is due to finish at the end of May, with the play-offs in early June.

National League clubs might be able to furlough their players until April, but as it stands they would still have to find the money for May’s pay packets.

At Hawks, players’ contracts run out at the beginning of May or on the date of the last first team game - whichever is later.

Their last game of the regular National League season is scheduled for May 29 at home to Concord Rangers.

It is looking increasingly likely that will never be played, along with most of their other remaining matches.