It's not all that often that the people running the Football Association get much credit - but they deserve some this week for their decision regarding the Chesham Utd v Redditch Utd, played, but not completed, on October 15th.
The game, an Evo-Stik Southern League Premier Division fixture, was abandoned after 52 minutes when a Redditch player hit the referee. Chesham were leading 1-0 at the time, and the reason for the Redditch player's ire was that the ref had just awarded a penalty against his team.
The referee abandoned the game; Redditch apologised profusely, made no excuse for the player involved, and announced that he would not play for them again - doing all this around the time the game would have finished.
The player was banned until the end of the 2013-2014 season. And then: The Southern League announced that the game should be replayed. I suppose they took the view that Chesham might not have won it . . .
Chesham appealed. Earlier this week, the FA announced that the result of the game should stand. I hope that Chesham aren't beaten to a play-off or automatic promotion place on goal difference.
