AFC Fylde owner's chance to state his case

The Coasters’ chairman received a surprise phone call out of the blue from National League chairman Brian Barwick.

It comes after Haythornthwaite made a host of vocal comments about how the league should be completed and what can be done to make the game more sustainable for clubs in non-league.

“I was quite surprised that I had an invitation from Brian Barwick, the chairman of our league, to have a Zoom meeting,” Haythornthwaite revealed in his latest video for the club website.

“They feel like some of my attacks – for want of a better word – were unjustified.

“I laid out clearly my areas of frustration: we don’t know when the league is going to start, we shouldn’t be doing the play-offs, there’s no discussion about salary caps, there’s conflicts of interest and so on and so on.

“I listed six or seven things I was concerned about and the fact I hadn’t had replies to previous emails and letters.

“I was pleasantly surprised when I received the phone call and we had a two-hour video meeting where we went through every one of those points line by line.

“To be fair, they were very respectful and I was equally respectful to them. I’m passionate about a number of these things and sometimes passion can be seen as aggression by certain people.

“I have to say thank you to them for taking the time to do that, but having said that I’m not sure I came out of the meeting with any more real answers than I went into it with.

“The conversation went along the lines of ‘yes, we agree with most of what you say’ but in most cases this was followed by ‘however’.

“I was told we’re waiting on the EFL and everything hinges on that but I feel strongly that we shouldn’t be waiting on the EFL, so there was a difference of opinion there.

“They gave me a fair hearing when they didn’t need to do that, so hats off to them in that respect, but I didn’t feel we got anywhere or got any conclusions and that’s my point – we have to make decisions.

“Without repeating myself, we need to be consulting with the chairmen in the league and that’s just not happening. The end result was disappointing but the fact it happened, I was very pleased about.”