Leeds United encouragement as FA tell Premier League relegation must happen

The news is extremely important to Leeds United, who hope to win promotion to next season's top-flight, and could have knock-on effects down the pyramid.

Some clubs at the lower end of the Premier League table want the threat of relegation removed as a condition of supporting plans to play matches at neutral venues. Their argument is that doing so would damage the sporting integrity of the competition, making relegation impossible to justify.

The Football League, on the other hand, has come out strongly in favour of relegation, with chairman Rick Parry telling a House of Commons select committee last week he expected it to be maintained.

Clarke now appears to come out in favour of it too, apparently telling those on Monday's video conference between the top division clubs the FA will not sanction no relegation, or declaring the season null and void.

His intervention is significant because constitutionally, such a change would require the consent of English football's governing body.

Leeds United are currently top of the Championship, seven points clear of the play-off places with nine matches to play.

The Football League's position is that it hopes to complete the 2019-20, but Clarke's warning to Premier League clubs that they should plan in case this does not happen is another indication of the growing doubt about this, despite Prime Minister Boris Johnson outlining in Monday's covid-19 recovery strategy that the Government planned to allow televised behind-closed-doors elite sport in step two of its plan to ease the lockdown, which will start in June at the earliest, highlights the growing doubts about this.

It is expected Leagues One and Two of the Football League will abandon their seasons in the middle of this week but the FA's support for promotion and relegation suggests this should not cost Rotherham United their chances of winning promotion. It is also promising for Harrogate Town, second in the Conference.

Two teams are due to go up from the Conference this season, one automatically and one via play-offs. Although the season has been abandoned, the National League has not yet ruled out play-offs, waiting for the Football League to act before making its own decisions. If it were to dispense with play-offs, Harrogate would be front-runners to be promoted.

Barnsley are bottom of the Championship, and could expect to be relegated unless they are given the opportunity to make up the seven-point gap to safety in the remaining nine matches.

The emphasis is now on the leagues to see if they can find a way to safely start training then playing again which finds favour with enough clubs and can be completed before it becomes logistically impossible, which Parry has already said would mean a final match no later than July 31 for his divisions.

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