CHICHESTER HIT HARD BY SUSSEX FOOTBALL LEAGUE

Chichester City United will start the new season on minus ten points after being hit harder than expected for fielding a banned player.  

The Oaklands Park outfit have been hit for the 2009-10 campaign as well as having 19 points taken off last season's total.  It has stunned players and officials at the club, who will now have a major game of catch-up to play before they can even start thinking about challenging for a top-six finish in division one of the Sussex League.  

The only consolation is it could have been worse: there were suggestions among the authorities they should have 30 points deducted, which would have meant almost certain relegation to division two. 

City have been punished for playing Callum Cutler when he was banned by the Hampshire FA for an unpaid fine.  The fine dated back to 2006, when Cutler was playing for a Havant Sunday League team. He said he paid the fine to his club, but the Hants FA never received. 

He was banned for non-payment but never received notification, and it was only after Cutler was sent off for Chichester in a Brighton Charity Cup game a few months ago that his ban came to light.  Chichester always expected to have 19 points – those accrued with Cutler in the side – deducted from last season's total, which saw their final position switch from seventh to 14th. 

But chairman John Hutter said the second points deduction, applied to the new season, was a bolt from the blue.  "We don't know where this has come from, but didn't expect it at all.  "The league tell us the decision was made based on FA advice.  "Initially, it was being suggested we should be deducted 30 points and fined £1,050.  "By negotiation, that is now ten points and a £550 fine now, with another £500 suspended for three years and payable only through poor conduct." 

Hutter said the club had decided not to appeal against the penalty for fear of the higher deduction being imposed if the plea was unsuccessful.  "While a ten-point deduction is unwelcome, 30 points would be so much worse.  "Look at what happened to Luton in League Two last season. "They started on minus 30 and never recovered. It would be difficult to stay up. Much as we don't like it, I think we have to take it on the chin." 

The league's decision came after the Sussex FA found the club guilty of fielding an ineligible player and City decided not to appeal. Hutter said the FA had sympathy for the club – who had always insisted they could not have known about Cutler's ban if he did not know about it himself – and City felt they had been as lenient as they could be within the rules. 

As reported in the Observer, the Sussex FA also handed City 15 disciplinary points and Cutler five for the start of the new season.  That means Chichester already have 20 points in a system which begins to punish clubs when they reach 48.  Perhaps the biggest victim in the saga is Cutler himself. He chose not to attend the squad's end-of-season party because he was embarrassed at the episode.

Report Written by the Chichester Observer