League One will reportedly be brought to a premature end this week, despite the Blues and other clubs having demanded that the campaign is played to its conclusion.
According to the Daily Telegraph, following the impasse at Friday’s conference call, discussions have taken place between the clubs and EFL chairman Rick Parry over the weekend.
Each club was asked to put forward their thoughts on the way forward ahead of a vote which could take place on Tuesday with a meeting scheduled for tomorrow morning.
Despite six clubs - the Blues, Peterborough, Oxford, Sunderland, Fleetwood and Portsmouth - having issued a collective statement through Posh chairman Darragh MacAnthony on Thursday, and with as many as 11 clubs reportedly keen for the season to be played to an end behind closed doors, the majority of the 23 sides want the division brought to a halt now, as League Two unanimously opted to do on Friday.
Many clubs are unable to afford to stage their remaining games behind closed doors or the meet the cost of the large number of coronavirus tests which would be required.
Places will reportedly be confirmed based on points-per-game (PPG) or weighted PPG - whichever is deemed fairer by a statistician - with Coventry and Rotherham set to be promoted automatically with the third promotion spot going to the winners of play-offs which will involve the usual four or perhaps eight clubs.
The proposal to extend the play-offs came from MacAnthony at Friday’s meeting and was initially viewed as a semi-serious suggestion, and is subject to opposition with some clubs believing it contravenes EFL regulations.
Even if the play-offs are expanded to eight clubs, the Blues wouldn’t be involved if places were decided on either PPG scenario. While Town are 10th in the table as it stands, they drop to 11th under both PPG formulas.
That would be Town’s lowest finish since 1952/53 when the Blues, then managed by Scott Duncan, were 16th in Division Three South.