Friday, November 5, 2021 at 5:28 PM• Jeroen van Poppel • Last update: 17:32

There is a good chance that amateur football will be shut down again in the short term, says chairman Ad Westerhof of the Amsterdam football club AFC in conversation with The Telegraph. According to Westerhof, amateur clubs are heavily burdened by the new corona measures, which make it mandatory to check for a corona admission ticket from Saturday. “Everyone denies it, but the competition is about to stop,” says Westerhof.

As a result of the tightened measures, football associations throughout the country must check for corona proof from Saturday. Without a QR code, no access is allowed to the sports canteen, the changing room or even the toilet. The cabinet initially made the admission ticket compulsory for the entire football field, so also outside, but it changed its mind after fierce protests. However, according to Westerhof, the relaxations are not sufficient for amateur football.

The chairman of AFC has hired security guards to check for QR codes. “You can’t let volunteers do that, I don’t feel like hassle. But hiring security guards just costs money. If this continues and we have to check every day, it will cost 25,000 to 35,000 euros until Christmas. club. We do have some reserves, but we also need opponents. A lot of clubs will get into trouble again because of this.”

Westerhof therefore thinks it would be better if amateur football was stopped for the time being, as happened last year as a result of the corona crisis. “As far as I’m concerned, the KNVB will make it a very long winter break and we will continue at the beginning of February,” said the AFC president. “Because this is almost impossible to do like this.” Westerhof is critical of government policy. “The crazy thing is that, as far as we know, a massive outbreak of the corona virus has not yet occurred anywhere on football fields.”