Andy Hessenthaler has issued a chilling warning that the Coronavirus pandemic is going to have severe consequences for football in Kent if – or indeed when – the season 2020/2021 begins.
Hessenthaler’s Dover side should have been finishing their National League campaign this weekend challenging for the post season. But that was before the virus and Lockdown.
The Dover boss told KSN, “This weekend would have been our last game of the season after all, so you could say that we’re in the same position as we were going to be. Now they’ve said that we won’t be finishing our season in terms of finishing the games.
“Now whether it’s done in terms of null and void; they’re talking about points per game and then deciding things that way. It’s still up in the air really in terms of how they eventually conclude it, but we know that we’re not going to be playing any games now for this season!”
“I have to say that I don’t envy the people making the decisions as it’s not easy, but you have to still go back to the fact that football at the moment is still secondary in terms of the amount of people who are still dying every day because of the virus.”
“Football will come back, and it will come back hopefully soon, but there will be consequences I’m sure because of the Coronavirus – it’s going to Affect the finances and hit football quite hard and it’s going to take a couple of years to recover from the situation. But we will recover!”
“Being a football person and being in football pretty much most of my life, we will re-group and we will go again. But it is going to affect us in the next couple of years financially at most clubs, particularly in the lower Leagues.”
The Dover boss did have words of sympathy for football fans – he said, “It’s been really tough for us guys who are in the game every day, but for the supporters out there, they miss it – it’s our way of life, but it’s their release at weekends when they supporters want to go and watch their football teams.”
“I think everyone is massively missing it and it’s really testing us at the moment – everybody’s pulling together! Obviously, the NHS are doing a fantastic job and our hats must go off to those people for what they’re doing for the country is absolutely phenomenal and everybody in the Country is behind them and are doing the best they can for them.”
“It’s a real tough time for the Country – fingers crossed we’ll get out of it soon and we can get our lives back to “normal” – or fairly normal – again!”
The Dover boss however did have sympathies for Barrow who “finished” the campaign four points clear of the field. “They’ve had a fantastic season,” Hessenthaler admitted, “and Ian (Evatt) has done a great job there.”
“They’ve had a good season and they are top of the table as it stands at the moment because they’ve been the best team over thirty-eight games or whatever it is, and if they don’t go up, it will be really tough on Barrow.”
“Harrogate are not far behind and remember as it stands at the moment, we were only two points off the Play Offs with a game in hand!” Hessenthaler said reflecting on his own side’s position.
He went on, “We were still in a very good position with the best away record in the League along with Boreham Wood I believe; for me we’ve had a good season, but it’s just a shame that we couldn’t finish it off. The decision though has been made and now the League have to decide what to do with promotion and relegation.”
Looking ahead to 2020/2021, the Dover boss confirmed, “We’re quite lucky in terms of the squad that we assembled at the start of last season as we’ve got twelve still available under contract for next season, so that gives us a good start in terms of that squad-wise because we’ve got a good nucleus – every season you’d like to add to it, but again.”
“I’ve already had a short conversation with my Chairman for another day – we’re going to have to talk about the Club itself going forward – now whether that means that changes have to be made with us going back to part-time – it’s not been said, but that could be the case because of this situation!”
“I hope that’s not the case, but it’s certain that the Chairman is going to sit down with me when we go back and I’ll be steered by him and what he wants to do going forward in terms of the finances and how he wants to do it for next season.”
“My gut feeling is that preparing for the new season… now whether it’s going to be a shorter pre-season I don’t know – they might do that because of getting the games in.”
“I would like to think that we can start the season maybe September or October instead of August 8th – I’d like to think it could be September or October but honestly, I really don’t know! I did see one article that said that the National League might not start until next year in January!”
“That could be crazy but again we’ve just put the Euro’s back to next summer – surely our League has obviously got to fall in line with League Two and the rest of the pyramid, so I can’t see it starting in January because of the Euros! September? October? Let’s hope so, but who knows?”