Lancashire FA

[jrgbfc]

So it appears tonight the Lancashire FA have taken the decision to suspend all amateur football in the Pendle, Burnley and Blackburn areas until the end of January.
Bit of a slap in the face for everyone who's put the effort in to preparing for a restart this weekend. Not to mention all the kids who will have been looking forward to getting back playing tomorrow.

[Leyland Claret]

Shambolic is one of the words that comes to mind. Many of the other words would have me banned off the forum!!

[Foulthrow]

An awful decision. Not looking forward to telling my lad about this. He’s been looking forward to his football for some time now.

[wilks_bfc]

Not to sound over dramatic but as a coach this is devastating.

Teams have excitedly returned to training last night, some tonight completely unaware, ready for this weekends games only for them to be taken away for another month (at least)

[MACCA]

When it's a case of amateur football v peoples lives, the later has to come first.
There really no contest, and safe to say most game would have been off anyway with the weather.

[Claretincraven]

I'm not sure what else they could do. Non essential travel is against guidelines. How do teams do when they are playing a team in tier 2? The Craven League has teams from Craven (tier 2), Pendle and Bradford (both tier 3). No doubt there will be other similar examples.

[fanzone]

Absolutely shambolic to agree for the return of it to then pull it at the 11th hour. I agree it shouldn't restart until at least January but to dangle the carrot is a disgrace.

[Steve-Harpers-perm]

Ok to sit inside a classroom together all day should be ok to play sports outside on a field especially the younger children. Poor to announce it so late on a Friday evening.

[Leisure]

What reason have they given for the very late decision?

[MACCA]

Ok to sit inside a classroom together all day should be ok to play sports outside on a field especially the younger children. Poor to announce it so late on a Friday evening.

Education is far more important than a game of kids football.
And with some children these days maybe more education and less football ( or their sport of choice ) would be beneficial.

[bfcmik]

And it is OK for a group of up to 16 higher risk, older people to get together to play organised walking football. My club, also in a tier 3 area despite 7 day new case rates of just 155.3 per 100k population (Burnley is 284.5), opened their doors again Wednesday morning and all 4 sessions each day have been booked solid.

However, I know discussions were taking place within the Birmingham County FA before the 4 week lockdown about suspending Junior football for a while because parents and other supporters tended to congregate rather than socially distance appropriately.

[BurnleyFC]

An absolute joke of a decision.

The ‘powers that be’ that have decided this should hang their heads in shame, or even better, resign.

[wilks_bfc]

This is the email we received from the LFA at 18:32 this evening

An Open Letter from Simon Gerrard, CEO of Lancashire FA

Decision made to suspend football activity in eight Local Authorities until the New Year.

Like the vast majority of you, I love football. The same applies to every member of the team that works with me at Lancashire FA, which is why we do our best to develop the game as best we can across the county.

However, it’s also the reason we sometimes need to make decisions that serve the best interest of the game and our participants, volunteers and spectators, for a long-term benefit. Today is an example of one of those types of decisions.

Although COVID-19 infections are decreasing across the County, it remains incredibly prominent in some parts of Lancashire and continues to take the lives of a number of people infected.

With relaxation in the rules on households mixing during Christmas period, we need to take joint action to avoid another rise over the coming weeks.

Following lengthy and detailed conversations with Public Health for Lancashire, Public Health for Blackburn and Darwen, Public Health England, Lancashire County Council and Lancashire Police, Lancashire FA – in conjunction with partners – has made the decision to suspend all grassroots football activity, both youth and adult, across the following Local Authorities in the county: Pendle, Burnley, Hyndburn, Rossendale, Blackburn with Darwen, Ribble Valley, Preston and South Ribble until January 2021 at the earliest.

This means no training, no friendly fixtures and no league fixtures are to be played throughout December, whilst no festivals or competitions will be sanctioned by Lancashire FA until the end of January.

It also means that any player residing in one of the affected boroughs can NOT play for a team in an unaffected borough, frustrating though we know this is.

Football is important to us all, but the game also has a wider social responsibility to those involved. We appreciate the mental health benefits that involvement in football provides, however, the health and survival of everybody, whether it be players, coaches, referees, volunteers or spectators, is paramount and can’t be overlooked.

Statistics, provided to me throughout our detailed conversations with various stakeholders, highlighted the sheer scale of the potential impact that continuing grassroots football in these eight areas would have – details that I hope we can make public next week.

Our decision has drawn support and encouragement from all of the Local Authorities involved, in addition to representatives from Public Health.

We strongly wish that there was a way in which football could continue in these eight areas throughout December. However, when faced with the statistics, information and opinions of those with a greater understanding of COVID-19 and the spread of the virus, it is clear there is not a way for that to happen.

I urge you all to respect the decision that has been made and to stay safe in the coming weeks; so that you can all enjoy a happy and healthy festive period and prepare for us to return to the game we all love in the New Year.

Simon Gerrard
CEO, Lancashire FA

[Steve-Harpers-perm]

Education is far more important than a game of kids football.
And with some children these days maybe more education and less football ( or their sport of choice ) would be beneficial.

I’d argue sport is equally important to their mental health and physical well-being.

[MACCA]

There's millions of children across the world with absolute colossal problems compared to the ones in Lancashire that simply cannot play football at a weekend for the next month...

1st world problems eh.

And its ironically been done to help save lives.

[jrgbfc]

Seems bonkers to me that up and down the country today people will be crowding into places like Primark and IKEA but kids aren't allowed to go for a game of football.
I get that it's all about the economy but what's the long term damage of kids spending weeks on end glued to their computers? How many will get out of the habit of playing footy and not bother going back?

[wilks_bfc]

Seems bonkers to me that up and down the country today people will be crowding into places like Primark and IKEA but kids aren't allowed to go for a game of football.
I get that it's all about the economy but what's the long term damage of kids spending weeks on end glued to their computers? How many will get out of the habit of playing footy and not bother going back?

That’s been the worry for most clubs/teams

During the first lockdown I was doing weekly challenges for my team to do. This was easy enough for them to do whilst we still had the weather and daylight, but during the winter this will be more difficult.

I’ll try keep them involved & active as much as I can but it will be difficult and I don’t think I’ll “lose” any when we get eventually back but it will be hard

[Claret Till I Die]

Couldn't they play the games over the 5 day Christmas break that covid is having ?

[TVC15]

So why are Lancashire FA the only one to have taken this decision when so many other parts of the country are also in tier 3 ?
Surely given the low risk category of the players involved they could have just put appropriate protocols in place and even made these protocols stricter for a while - eg limiting spectators or parents etc.

Would be interesting to know why Lancashire FA have taken this decision in isolation of other FAs.

[wilks_bfc]

So why are Lancashire FA the only one to have taken this decision when so many other parts of the country are also in tier 3 ?
Surely given the low risk category of the players involved they could have just put appropriate protocols in place and even made these protocols stricter for a while - eg limiting spectators or parents etc.

Would be interesting to know why Lancashire FA have taken this decision in isolation of other FAs.

It’s not even the whole of Lancashire, only the 8 areas of Pendle, Burnley, Hyndburn, Rossendale, Blackburn with Darwen, Ribble Valley, Preston and South Ribble.
Those in Blackpool, Fylde, Chorley etc can still play

[dushanbe]

Absolute shocker of a decision. They've had a month to voice their concerns if they had any - and they didn't - they made that clear with the constant pumping out of information about a return to grassroots football. As late as Friday morning they were posting clarification about indoor football being permitted and then at six o'clock, two days after the restart they pull it.