Northampton Town Chairman Kelvin Thomas has thanked supporters who have been asking the club about season tickets for the 2020/21 season.
The club are yet to put season tickets on sale, choosing to wait until the situation becomes clearer. Despite the uncertainty, many supporters have contacted the club to say they still want to buy season tickets to support and help the club through a difficult time, something the Chairman says he very much appreciates.
"We have been overwhelmed by the support from the fans, not just about next season's season tickets but about this season's season tickets too," he said.
If we don't finish the games this season, a lot of people have contacted us to say they don't want a refund and that is very much appreciated. At a time when we are losing money anyway it would be a big help to the club to not have to refund season tickets. At the moment we are having to build budgets around a number of different scenarios and we are waiting to see what will happen. We are prepared for what could happen but the response from supporters has been overwhelming. On top of that, a lot of fans have contacted us to say they still want to buy season tickets for next season, even with all the uncertainty, because they want to support the club.
"Our view right now is that we still need to be patient and not rush in to things in terms of putting season tickets on sale. Of course there is a big cash flow gap which myself, David Bower and the Board will cover and we have no issue with that. We need to wait until we know what is happening this season, and that will give us a clearer idea to know what we are selling next season, whether it be a regular season ticket or a combined online iFollow season ticket that transfers to a physical seat part way through the season. We are working up every option but we absolutely appreciate all the support the fans have shown and we will keep working on the models as more information comes to light.
"The reality is, as a League 2 club, the majority of our income is through season ticket money and gate money and it will have a financial impact if we have to play behind closed doors for a period of time.
"However, at this point we need to be wary of media reports, not look too far ahead and we need to focus on facts. We don't need to get too carried away by speculation.
"We have a great streaming platform with iFollow and we have been looking at all sorts of different models using iFollow and seeing what we can do there to mitigate some of the financial impact if we can't allow supporters back for a period of time."