Highland League secretary Rod Houston says the Highlands and Moray being placed in tier one of Scotland’s coronavirus restriction system is encouraging as they assess when the new season could start.
The Highlands and Moray being in tier one means 11 clubs in the Highland League would be allowed to admit a restricted number of supporters to grounds.
However, with Aberdeenshire being placed in tier two Inverurie Locos, Formartine United, Fraserburgh, Huntly, Turriff United and Deveronvale would not be allowed to let fans in.
The division’s league management committee will meet tonight and a decision about whether to plan to start the 2020-21 season on November 28, or push the beginning of the campaign back further, may be made.
The league could potentially request special dispensation to allow the Aberdeenshire clubs to let fans in like their counterparts in Moray and the Highlands.
Houston said: “Getting 11 clubs into tier one to allow spectators in has been very encouraging, but we know we have to do a little bit of work to see if we can get the six Aberdeenshire clubs to have spectators as well so everyone can start with spectators.
“That’s a challenge we’re working our way through and at the league management committee meeting we’ll be able to take stock of things and have a better idea of what is possible.
“We’re exploring options just now and we do have to be careful how we go about things and not lose sight of the fact there is a global pandemic going on.
“If we were to ask for any form of dispensation we would need to have clear and credible reasons for that.
“Getting a lot of young people out and being physically active, as they teams would be, and people getting a chance to go back to watching football I would argue makes a big contribution to the wellbeing agenda.”
The Highland League took the decision to delay the start of the new season until November 28 at the earliest on September 27, having previously been aiming for an October 17 start.
Houston added: “When the original decision was taken there were quite a lot of unknowns, now there are still a number of imponderables but we now know a lot more about the likely scenario for the next while.
Players need supporters back in grounds, says Fraserburgh chairman Finlay Noble
“The chances are this thing is going to be hanging around for quite some time so we’ve got to see if we can be in a position to make all the arrangements that minimise the risk while getting the benefit of football being played and spectators getting in.
“We’ll have to deal with changing circumstances as they occur, but ultimately it will be the clubs that decide depending on how they feel.”
The Highland League was able to complete the 2019-20 Utilita Highland League Cup behind closed doors on Saturday as Rothes defeated Buckie Thistle 2-1 at Christie Park, Huntly.
Along with the two semi-finals, the fixture was supposed to be streamed live online, however, a technical problem prevented that from happening with fans who paid for the service being refunded.
Houston says the league will assess the merits of the streaming in due course.
He said: “Huntly did a fantastic job staging the Utilita Highland League Cup final and the company representatives were delighted with it.
Full statement from our Media Partner regarding the coverage of yesterday’s Highland League Cup Final. https://t.co/YLWfYckGj5
— The Highland League (@ScottishHFL) November 1, 2020
“We were naturally disappointed that happened (the streaming problem), but these things are sent to try us.
“The set-up with the streaming of the three games was in good faith as an experiment and it’s given us a lot of food for thought.
“We will now look at that and see what we take from it. Right now refunds for the final are being organised and after that we’ll get the stats up viewers.
“We’re interested to see where they were from and things like that and we’ll get to that in due course.”
