Paul Warne on why a season extension is unlikely for Rotherham United

ROTHERHAM UNITED manager Paul Warne is not holding out too much hope for an extension to the EFL season - even though he is adamant it is the commonsense move.
Paul Warne.Paul Warne.
Paul Warne.

The Millers have suffered five postponements already in a season which has been affected by both Covid-19 issues and the bad weather - and are playing catch-up on all their rivals.

The Championship strugglers, who visit Bournemouth on Wednesday night, still have to fit in 19 league matches this term, with the season due to finish on May 8 - in than the three months' time.

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The window to fit in matches is further reduced by a fortnight-long international break for Championship clubs from late March to the start of April.

But despite the issues for the Millers, Warne is not envisaging an extension to their campaign.

He said: "I have said that I thought there should have been an extra month added to the season to allow for these situations because what is going to happen if we have another game called off is we might end up playing Saturday, Tuesday, Thursday, which is nigh-on impossible.

"It used to be possible in the non-league days, when it was light you could play at 6pm on a Thursday night, I used to love that, but physically it is impossible.

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"I don't know how the top teams have been doing it, I would like to think a bit of common sense would come in, but at the minute it is not a disadvantage to enough teams for it to be an issue, that's the truth.

"If there were 16 teams who had to get in all these extra games, there would be a weight of managers asked about it. At the moment it is only probably in my direction.

"The other option I thought of was to try and play in the international break, but a lot of the teams in this league have a lot of internationals, it is not so much of an issue for us.

"Playing Saturday-Tuesday with a fully-fit side (is fine), but as soon as you got a couple of injuries you are in all sorts of bother.

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"I would like it to get extended, the problem with extending it is you have to change all of the play-off games and all those games and it would put off next season and then we could have the same problem.

"There will be a reluctance up top but common sense should prevail, even a couple of weeks would allow teams to get those games in.

"It has been disappointing we have had those games off, having Cardiff off was a disaster, I would have much preferred to play them without (Sean0 Morrison or Kieffer Moore. It is frustrating and hopefully we don't have any more games called off."