A NEWTOWN Football Club official has warned Cymru Premier clubs will go to the wall unless supporters are allowed back into venues soon.

Newtown finance director Barry Gardner called upon the Football Association of Wales (FAW) to take action now or risk seeing clubs fold by the end of 2020.

He said: "I think the league will have to consider how long it can force clubs and pressurise them into running at a high financial loss.

"At the end of the day the players are paid players and the club require the income to pay them.

"It's not fair on the players to ask them to play for free because that creates more and more problems.

"It's not a sustainable long-term thing so unless we get a stop point, even a postponement just to fully understand what's happening, then we are going to be in a very dangerous position."

The current Welsh Government rules on sport and spectators has led to an outcry from Welsh pyramid clubs while Merthyr Town will not be running a side in this season's English Southern League.

Gardiner warned Welsh pyramid clubs could fold "sooner rather than later."

"There are teams higher up in the division that have European money that will help them to probably kick the can down the road a little bit but the problem is there are going to be clubs that are going to hit that wall sooner than other clubs and that's the worry, that 12 teams don't make it beyond Christmas."

The club has received grant aid from the Football Foundation to make Latham Park compliant.

However Gardner stressed such work was moot while the Welsh Government ruled fans were not able to attend grounds on match day.

"There's no real point in making our ground Covid compliant if you don't have any fans to appreciate it. We can put as many hand sanitisers around the ground, but no one actually needs them."

With coronavirus and lockdown restrictions impacting all aspects of life, Gardner warned the current financial losses were unsustainable and urged the Welsh Government to lift its ban on supporters soon or risk losing clubs.

"We have had a massive reduction in terms of bar sales at the social club," Gardiner added. "Parties, christenings and funerals are massively down so we're not generating any off-the-field income.

"The academy evenings you'd have anything like 30 to 40 parents here and the tea hut and the vending machines would be bringing in a good source of money.

"Sponsorship has been extremely difficult. Without supporters it's difficult to get the sponsors to come on board as well."