The
Derbyshire outfit were in eleventh place in the Premier Division when the
season came to a halt due to the coronavirus.
A
short statement from the club reads: “Is it with great sadness that South
Normanton Athletic have resigned from the Midland League
We
would like to thank the Midland Football League for the opportunity of playing
in this league."
After
the decision was made, the club have decided to relieve management team and
club treasurer and secretary Richard Strzyzewski from their roles within the
club. Manager
Marc Strzyzewski said: “On hearing the news I was completely shocked and didn’t
quite believe it as first. I was told the decision to drop the club down was to
save the future, but this has come without any suggestion the club was in any
kind of danger. I’ve become very involved at South Normanton and worked hard on
and off the pitch with the club`s best interests at heart along with helping
the finances in every way possible. Thom Kellogg, Lee Mitchell and I are
absolutely devastated with the decision. “When
we took on the challenge of South Normanton our objective was to assemble and
bring a team that for this level understood what it meant to be part of
something that could involve the community and a team that could not only
compete at Step 5 but one that could progress even more so. “Looking
back from where we have come from and what values we have installed as a group
we believe in a lot of ways we achieved our goal and began to really put South
Normanton on the map. “It`s a shame that all the progress is to be all in vain after this decision has
been made. We completely understand at any level the club`s interests must come
first but to not even be told plans or given a choice to even carry on is a
real shame. We feel the whole situation could have been dealt with more
transparency to ease the pain of letting go of something we have become so
attached to. It’s left a lot of people including the players at a loose end.
You only have to look at last season by breaking records in the FA Cup,
reaching the last 32 of the FA Vase and defeating all odds to reach the
Derbyshire senior cup final. So, to be told the club isn’t in good shape to
continue is so difficult to swallow.
“Although
this isn’t the end we wanted It’s been an amazing experience for us and one we
really didn’t want to let go of but sadly it’s out of our hands”.
It is not known at this stage whether South Normanton will continue at a lower level.
|