Harborough Town Football Club can confirm that following our league fixtures on Saturday 27th January 2024 versus Gresley Rovers FC and Saturday 3rd February 2024 versus Bedworth United FC, The FA charged the football club for fielding an ineligible player in a league fixture.
The club recently received a fine from the FA and a further sanction of a one game suspension for the involved player, which has already been served, along with the initial 2 game suspension, which has also since been served by the player. The football club fully assisted the FA in their enquiries, and fully accept their findings.
The FA charges have been passed on to The Northern Premier League and the Football Club has since been charged by The Northern Premier League under rule 6.9 – playing of an ineligible player. The football club has fully assisted the league with their enquiries and as with the FA charge, which is totally separate, fully accept their findings.
Today (Sunday 14th April 2024) The Northern Premier League has enforced a mandatory deduction of any points gained in such games where an ineligible player has played. With the football club winning both these games the league has deducted 6 points from the club’s record with immediate effect, as well as also imposing a further fine.
Harborough Town Football Club would like to sincerely apologise to the players, the manager, and the management team, who have been nothing short of brilliant, so far this season. We would also like to sincerely apologise to our fantastic supporters, and everyone connected with the football club for this clerical error.
We understand that this will be extremely difficult to comprehend how such oversights can occur, and the football club can assure you all that measures have been put in place to ensure that a repeat of this error cannot happen again.
Having already secured a play-off place and still chasing automatic promotion we truly hope that this will galvanise everyone to get behind the team on the pitch for the remaining fixtures of the season, to drive us forward and achieve our end goal.
The football club will be making no further comment on this matter.
Board of Directors
Harborough Town Football Club.