Stevenage await expansion-plan ruling
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Your support makes all the difference.Despite playing a big part in last week's decision to increase the size of the Nationwide Conference to 24 clubs next season, and relegate only one side this term, Stevenage Borough may still have to finish outside the bottom three to escape the drop.
The expansion is part of a wider plan, also agreed last week, to reorganise non-League football below the Conference and create two 24-team divisions – the Alliance North and Alliance South – as a second tier of the Conference from the start of the 2004-05 season.
The introduction of the two new feeder leagues – which will be run by a committee of officials from the Ryman, Dr Martens and UniBond leagues – has the backing of the Football Association. That is not yet the case with the enlargement of the Conference next season.
Relegating only one team this campaign was decided by a 13-7 vote, with two abstentions, at last week's meeting of Conference club chairmen. It was proposed unexpectedly by Phil Wallace, the chairman of Stevenage Borough, who are third from bottom of the league. It is, however, subject to ratification by the FA's National Leagues Sanctions Committee, and that is not guaranteed.
The FA has in the past been against proposed rule changes agreed mid-term that affect the following season, so the Conference may have to wait a year for its extra two clubs and increased revenue. That is what Graham Westley, the Stevenage manager, expects.
"I believe that three clubs will go down – it is my job to ensure that Stevenage Borough are not one of them," said Westley, whose side beat the bottom team, Kettering Town, 2-0 at Broadhall Way on Tuesday to climb one place in the table.
The biggest attendance in English football on Wednesday, 2,338, saw AFC Wimbledon gain a 1-0 home win over Merstham to cut Wallingford's lead in the Seagrave Haulage Combined Counties League to 10 points.
The top two meet tomorrow at the same venue, Kingsmeadow stadium, which on Monday the Dons Trust (the owners of AFC Wimbledon) voted to buy from the Ryman League club, Kingstonian, who will become tenants instead of landlords. The cost of the deal, over £2.5m, is a worry for some AFC Wimbledon supporters.
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