Battling amateur football club Kilburn forfeits division three match

BATTLING  Kilburn Football Club is blaming miscommunication for what it is calling a one-off forfeit in the amateur football league.

BATTLING  Kilburn Football Club is blaming miscommunication for what it is calling a one-off forfeit in the amateur football league.

The Chics’ division three game against Salisbury was called off at Salisbury Oval on Saturday because only 15 Kilburn players arrived at the ground on time.

The forfeit comes after the club, which only has one senior team, lost its first four games by a total of 1423 points.

Kilburn treasurer Danny Parks said the forfeit was a result of some players thinking the game was on at 3pm, rather than 2.15pm, and others not having a lift to the ground.

He said the club was not short of players and had a squad of “25 to 29”.

“It was more of a misunderstanding of time more than anything — a couple of them thought it was a 3pm game,” Parks said.

“A couple of Sudanese guys who don’t speak a lot of English — we’re trying to manage them, organise to pick them up and get them to the game, but it wasn’t done as well as it should’ve been.

“We ended up having enough (players) turn up, but we’d already declared a forfeit.

“We made a mistake, but definitely won’t be forfeiting again because we do have the players.”

Parks said the club intended to stay in division three for the remainder of the season.

“I knew once this forfeit came about, people would say, ‘I told you so, you wouldn’t be able to manage it’, but it’s not the case and we’ll be up ready to bat this week.”

League chief executive John Kernahan said officials would assess Kilburn’s situation if the forfeits happened regularly.

He said Kilburn would need to reimburse Salisbury’s financial losses from an abandoned home game, which could be up to $1500.