CHARD Town Football Club has explained its reasoning behind the choice not to appeal the Football Association's decision to relegate the club from the Western League.

The club held its AGM on Tuesday evening, at which it was shown that the relegation was due to: its Zembard Lane pitch having too steep a gradient; the club not yet receiving accepted planning permission for a new site; any development not able to be completed until 2022 at the earliest; and a club needing to be relegated from the Western League (and it being deemed unfair to relegate a fully compliant club).

READ MORE: Chard Town relegated despite mid-table finish

The Robins released a full statement, which said: "It was deemed that the club, despite feeling harshly treated, did not have the grounds to appeal on the four points above.

"Having also spent the most part of the seven-day appeal period with no response from the FA to our repeated enquiry regarding the cost to appeal, it was also decided that, as an appeal could cost upwards of £500, this was not a case of ‘trying our luck’.

"We will, however, be expressing our deep feelings of anguish at our mistreating in an open letter to the FA in due course.

"We expect to find out which Step 7 league we will be allocated to when the FA publish them at the end of next week.

"Until then, we presume this will be the Somerset County League Premier Division.

"This decision will in no way affect our efforts to relocate and it remains our ambition to provide our town with Western League Football.

"A planning decision is expected in the coming months, which we remain hopeful will be in the best interest of the town.

"We hope to bounce back as quickly as we can and will be looking for clarification from the FA on this as the dust settles."