Slough Town's games against Chippenham Town and Ebbsfleet United postponed due to COVID events

Slough Town aren’t set to play another league match until December 9 after their games at Chippenham Town this evening (Tuesday) and Ebbsfleet United next week were postponed due to COVID-19 events.

Due to a potential COVID-19 event affecting someone on the Rebels staff the club was forced to call off the game at Chippenham. 

Their next game was due to be at Ebbsfleet United next Tuesday (December 1), however, there have been positive COVID-19 tests among Fleet’s players and support staff. As a result, they have entered a 14-day period of self-isolation on the advice of the league’s medical officer.

The member of staff in question is awaiting test results and if they are found to be positive the management team and players will have to go through a 14-day isolation period before they can play again.

The club’s next scheduled league match will be at Havant & Waterlooville on Wednesday, December 9.

“The decision was taken to call off tonight’s game because we have a staff member living with someone who’s tested positive for COVID-19,” said joint manager Jon Underwood. “The normal protocol is that we had to inform the league and the decision was taken to call off the game.

“Our game at Ebbsfleet is off because of the positive cases at that club. Chippenham Town is off tonight and that’s down to us, but the Ebbsfleet game is down to them having some definite positive cases.

“If our case is positive then we will not be able to do anything for two weeks. At the moment there has been no positive test for us, but this is called a COVID event and it means you have a potential COVID issue until you get a negative test to say you’re ok.

“We’ve seen this in our league now. Bath have had a two-week isolation period; Welling are in one now and Ebbsfleet United have just announced one. We’ll have to do the same if the result comes back positive. It’s frustrating for all concerned but it’s right to follow the protocol.”

The Rebels were looking to arrest a run of poor form that’s seen them lose four league games in a row. On Saturday they played quite well for periods in a 2-0 defeat to league leaders Dartford, but now they have two-and-a-half weeks before they’re set to get back to competitive action with potentially no group training allowed in the meantime.

“We have no game on Saturday because it’s our weekend off as there are an uneven number of teams in our league,” added Underwood. “The following Saturday we were due to come into the FA Trophy, but those sides haven’t been able to play the previous round. We had been looking at options to put a game on that weekend, but we won’t do that until we know where we stand. As it stands it will be two-and-a-half weeks until our next game on December 9.

“If we can’t train for that period, which ends the day before the Havant game, we wouldn’t feel it’s fair to go straight back into a game having not trained together.”