Coventry-based Copsewood recently won promotion to the Premier League but manager Ryan Conneely is hoping a geographical imbalance won’t see them placed in the Southern Division.
SK: How and when did you discover the possibility of being placed in the FA Premier League Southern Division?
RC: We had heard rumours that we would be placed into the Southern Premier before we had even won the league. Nothing has been confirmed yet but the rumours appear to be getting stronger.
SK: Has the prospect dampened your excitement for next season?
RC: I wouldn’t say it has dampened our excitement, as we are just thrilled to be competing in the Premier level but it will make things a whole lot harder in terms of the players having to travel further to games and with the added costs of petrol, etc.
SK: Is there a better solution in your view?
RC: I think a solution would be to have both ourselves and Coventry City play in the Northern Division. It may mean that one of the leagues has more teams in it but surely that makes logical sense? I can’t see an extra two games a season having such a big impact on the league or the clubs, especially when we play within an hour of half the teams in the Northern Premier anyway.
SK: What do you estimate would be the difference in mileage?
RC: I’ve actually worked it out based on this season’s teams and if we had played in the Southern Premier it would have been 2,600 miles based on a return journey as well (this excluding Coventry City who play 4 miles from us, so it was a team less). The Northern Premier was a total of just 2,050 miles so there is a significant difference between the leagues. Another issue in regards to this question is our players’ travel. Some of them live a considerable distance away from Coventry as it is, so to add their own journey onto the team’s journey makes it even longer for them to have to travel.
SK: Would the extra travel see some players unable to attend every away game?
RC: I would like to think that the players will be able to attend away games but to put it into context, the majority of our players live scattered across the Midlands, so they would have an hour journey to meet at Coventry, then they would then have to travel another 3 hours to get to the ground and obviously would have to do the same on the way back. That would mean leaving their house at 8am Sunday morning and not getting back in until 9pm. That is a massive commitment for them to have to stick with for a whole season. The FA are rightly promoting the women’s game and pushing for greater participation rates but I feel placing us into the Southern Premier would be giving out the complete opposite message.
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