Silsden urge District FA rule change (From Keighley News)

Silsden urge District FA rule change

12:03pm Thursday 14th March 2013 in Sport

Holders Oxenhope Recreation have been re-instated in this season’s competition. The West Yorkshire League side had been knocked out in the quarter-finals by Silsden Reserves.

But the North West Counties League club breached a competition rule in fielding a player who had played for the first team in the preceding 28 days.

There was confusion over whether the rule applied to the original staging or the actual match date, and a replay was ordered.

But Silsden asked to withdraw from the competition due to not having enough eligible senior players, and instead it will be Oxenhope who travel to Steeton for Saturday’s semi-final. Silsden FC’s senior secretary John Barclay stated: “After careful consideration we would respectfully ask to allow Oxenhope to go through to the semi-final wtihout the need for a replay.

“Our reasons are follows: We believe that by having to deny our junior players the opportunity to be selected for our first team we are contradicting our successful youth-team development programme plans. We firmly believe that if a young player has made sufficient progress to be selected for a higher team within our club then that player’s development should come first.

“Chris Wademan, Josh McNulty and, since the Oxenhope game, three other youngsters have been given the opportunity to play in our first team.

“Therefore we would respectfully ask for rule 28 to be revisited and make changes to accommodate players who are on the fringe of making the step up.

“We would ask that any under-19 be allowed to compete, irrespective of the 28-day rule.”