Murdoch University Football Club are struggling to compete because of a lack of players due to the the covid pandemic.
Murdoch University Football Club vice president Danny Jones says the problem is likely to get worse.
“We can’t always guarantee a team will be complete, that is the challenge, I think we will see this in the second wave of covid, everyone who had it 12 weeks ago will be getting it again,” Mr Jones said.
This year Football West‘s governing body introduced a new policy that if five or more players are affected by Covid-19 a game would need to be postponed.
Football West spokesman Jake Drewn said the new policy is important.
“There is a process, the clubs have to go through they have to report to us, and we then give them a week to give us a new date for the postponed game,” Mr Drewn said.
Mr Jones says Football West should encourage players from younger leads to fill out the teams above their league for practice.
“Covid-19 disrupting the games has put pressure on relationships especially when you can’t go out again to play football as the game is postponed. Physically the players enjoy going to the game and being part of a team,” Mr Jones said.
The games usually run on Saturdays and Sundays.
“We select teams and put them into their teams and we select the categories on Thursday night we have our nice neat little squad night and by Sunday 10 per cent of our players we selected cannot play,” Mr Jones said.
This is the worst year, as the grants that were given at the start of the pandemic.
In the past, the football club was given grants and full-time employees had access to job-seeker. These payments have been ceased and the club depends on memberships for funds.
“The first year we went through lockdown, there was a slow down on registrations because people weren’t sure if they were paying for something they would ever use,” Mr Jones said.
“As a club we received some money from the government, so that allowed us to financially to be alright. The first year we were better off than this year, because we were financially supported and there weren’t so many covid cases,” Mr Jones said.
Mr Jones says that a lot of the games are being live streamed and people are watching and placing bets.
“We are actually shocked at the amount of overseas gamblers messaging us asking about the fixtures, so it has a small global reach,” Mr Jones said.
“There is no direct impact on us, but there is an interest outside the WA bubble,” Mr Jones said.