HAWKESDALE-Macarthur president Harry Elliott says the Mininera and District Football League's decision to cancel the 2020 season has a silver lining for next year.
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The league's executive voted on Wednesday night to abandon its season amid clubs fears of running a competition following the coronavirus pandemic.
Elliott, a third-year president, said it was a good decision and allowed clubs and the league to put this year behind them and prepare for 2021.
"As far we were concerned we were prepared not to go ahead and most of our committee was over it all," he said.
"It was also going to be a bit hard on our volunteers leading up to a start and through a season.
"Early days we thought it would go ahead but once we got to about a month ago we knew it was going to be too hard.
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"Everyone was getting less enthusiastic about it and they were all resigned to the fact it wouldn't go ahead.
"In 2021, who knows this pandemic could be still around and now we have time to plan and work things out.
"By then we would have them (our volunteers, members and players) educated. The hard part if we had have started now is the pressure on volunteers and the safety of all our members."
Penshurst president Brendan Kelly said cancelling was a "logical decision".
"The longer it has gone on the more difficult it was to commence and with recent happenings (with a rise in cases) it was pretty well impossible to have crowds," he said.
"For all clubs crowds is one of those factors and the other factor was safety of volunteers, players and members.
"Everybody will start to work on next season not knowing what it might look like but that's all we can do at this stage."
The league has committed to getting a junior competition off the ground this year.
Kelly said the Bombers were committed to fielding junior sides in all of the grades - under 16.5s and 12s football, 13 and under, 15s and 17s netball - this season.
Elliott said the Eagles were unsure if their juniors would play this year.
"We have to wait and see what it looks like and what sort of plan they have got," he said.
"It's also dependent on parents and whether they want their kids to play or they hold them back. We don't know what they will do."
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Sean Hardeman
I'm a sports journalist for the Warrnambool Standard who covers a number of different sports across the south-west of Victoria. I enjoy watching cycling, surfing, football, soccer and Formula 1.
I'm a sports journalist for the Warrnambool Standard who covers a number of different sports across the south-west of Victoria. I enjoy watching cycling, surfing, football, soccer and Formula 1.
