AFC Sudbury boss, Mark Morsley, firmly believes that some football clubs, both in non-league and ultimately even in the higher levels of the Football League pyramid, could end up “going bust in the next month or so.”

Morsley fears that several non-league clubs will go to the wall due to the complete loss of income, following the postponement of recent and upcoming fixtures in an effort to combat the spread of the Coronavirus infection.

In addition to all elite football in England being suspended, in the Premier League and the EFL, top non-league football in Suffolk and Essex has also been brought to a halt by the likes of the Southern League, Isthmian League and Thurlow Nunn Eastern Counties League all postponing matches last weekend.

“Scary times are ahead. I don’t want to be a prophet of doom, but I’ve been around non-league football long enough to know how things are run, and I can see some clubs going bust in the next month or so,” warned Morsley.

“No one is talking about this yet, but I will bring it up because most football clubs, with the exception of a select few at the top, live by means of hand to mouth. They work on strict budgets, with regards gate receipts, programmes, burgers, beers and alike, all on a match-to-match basis.

“That it the reality for semi-professional clubs, and most of those even at the top of the professional game.

“Clubs now have no income, while they still have the potential liability of paying players.

“I can certainly see a situation where some clubs start going to the wall, there is a big danger of that happening.

“There will need to be some hard decisions made by football clubs down the line.

“The longer the ban goes on, the more danger there is going to be of clubs going under, and who knows how long it will go on for?

“I know there will be clubs holding meetings this week, saying that they &rlquo;are in trouble.’

“The National League have chosen to carry on. They have more professional administrators in charge, while the further down the chain you go, these posts tend to be filled by volunteers, which is when you get the sort of knee-jerk reaction which I think has happened in the case of the Isthmian League and Southern League.

“We’ve already lost many games this season, due to all the rain, so a perfect storm seems to be brewing,” added Morsley.