As you are all probably aware, the club were suspended by Northumberland FA (NFA) from playing any matches on Saturday 4th and Sunday 5th January.
The club suspension came about as we had some coaches who were not fully compliant under FA rules to coach a junior football team on their own. To be compliant a coach needs to have the following. An FA level one coaching qualification, an Emergency Aid certificate, a Safeguarding Children certificate and a current DBS. Whilst all coaches should know when any qualifications need to be updated it is essentially down to the club secretary to make sure that everyone within the club are fully compliant.
On Tuesday 7th January myself and Barry, club chair, met with representatives from NFA to put things in place so that our teams were able to play this weekend 11th and 12th January. The meeting was very successful and we rectified a lot of the issues and just needed to go away and update various systems and databases. NFA informed Northumberland Football League on Wednesday morning that they were happy for Red House Farm teams to play this weekend, although a couple of teams may not meet the criteria therefore would have to cancel their matches. Members of the Northumberland League committee met on Wednesday and decided that they couldn’t let fixtures go ahead due to teams having to confirm matches on a Tuesday.
Thankfully, the club suspension has been officially lifted by NFA so our teams are eligible to play next weekend 18th and 19th January.
Both NFA and Northumberland League have acted absolutely correctly throughout this process and Angie Forster from NFA has been fantastic and worked tirelessly to help the club.
I can only apologise for the disruption this has caused and that process’ are now in place to ensure that this never happens again. I hope that this statement clears things up for everyone and we can all move forward and enjoy the rest of this season and beyond.
Cheers
Chris Mann
Secretary
On behalf of the trustees
