Barrow manager Ian Evatt says his side should be promoted to League Two after the National League season was ended because of the coronavirus pandemic.
Barrow led England’s fifth tier by four points with nine games to play before it was halted on 16 March.
On Wednesday clubs voted to end the season, but there has been no decision on promotion and relegation.
“Anything other than us being promoted would be being harsh,” Evatt told BBC Radio 5 Live.
“We’ve proven we were the best team over a long period of time. We were top for more or less for five months and no one has really got within punching distance.
“Obviously it’s bittersweet because we would have liked to have finished the job properly and have our fans see us lift the trophy, but I said to the players one thing no one can take away from us come the end of the season – we were top of the league, so credit to them.”
The National League’s top side is automatically promoted to the English Football League with clubs placed second to seventh going into play-offs to decide the second team to go up.
The bottom four are relegated to National League North and South, with the champions and play-off winners of each of the two lower leagues being promoted.
How will promotion and relegation be settled?
The question of ‘what happens now?’ is still to be answered.
In the National League eighth-placed Solihull Moors were three points off the final play-off place, but had a game in hand and a better goal difference than Stockport County who were one spot above them and in the play-offs.
Barnet, in 11th, were four points off the top seven but had only played 35 games – four less than Stockport and at least three fewer than many of their play-off rivals.
“Part of the difficulties that we’ve had with the resolution is that there’s a part one and then there’s effectively a part two,” David Bosomworth, chairman of sixth-placed Halifax Town, told BBC Radio Leeds.
“The difficulty for the clubs at the top and bottom is – what comes in part two?
“It’s been almost six weeks since we last played a home game and there’s been no consultation from the chairman of the National League to explain what those options could potentially be.”
The league said there was a “clear majority of clubs in favour” of ending the season from the almost 90% of responses returned.
But Havant and Waterlooville manager Paul Doswell felt they needed to be given some options of what is going to happen next. His side were second in National League South – three points off leaders Wealdstone having played a game more.
“Clubs could have voted on things like if points per game or the existing top two would have been the way to decide who gets promoted,” Doswell said.
“There were no alternatives available apart from just ‘end the season’. That’s what’s happened, the majority of clubs have gone with that and now we just wait to see probably over the next two to three weeks if there are viable options.”
The future?
As it stands there will be no football played for the foreseeable future, with sport only being restarted if the coronavirus situation in England meets the government’s five tests for lockdown restrictions to be eased.
There is no firm date for the Premier League to resume while the EFL told its clubs the earliest date players may return to training would be 16 May, meaning even if that date was met football would not restart until June.
Meanwhile, the non-league levels below the National League have already voided the entire season while the Scotland’s Championship, League One and League Two have also been curtailed.
For clubs like third-placed Notts County it presents a double problem of which league they prepare for.
With a play-off place a very real possibility and hopes of hauling back Barrow and Harrogate, manager Neal Ardley is struggling to plan his squad for a new season when he does not know when this campaign will end and what league his side could end up in.
“We’re looking at potentially what we might have to spend next season in the National League and what we’d have to spend if we went up,” he told BBC East Midlands Today.
“We’re kind of looking, but even players who we are interested in, you can’t make any inroads because we still don’t know if there’s a season to finish here.
“But it’s hard to get down about stuff like what might happen with the league and being able to finish fixtures when you see what people are going through.”
Boreham Wood chairman Danny Hunter feels National League football may not return for a long time:
“I’m a pessimist – I don’t think we’ll be playing non-league football for the rest of this year until the authorities can understand the full effects and impact of this pandemic to ensure they can safely open the grounds,” he told BBC Three Counties Radio.
“In football we’ve got a chance right now to recalibrate ourselves and look at our moral compass and when we come through this, be able to say, ‘we did our bit and we’re better for it’.
“When there’s life and death situations occurring at the moment – three points is absolutely nothing by comparison.”
