January 22, 2022

The weekend of 18th and 19th December saw the first NIHL games cancelled by teams citing Coronavirus as the reason for cancellation.

The EIHA will be providing clarity on the position of the Association which has been consistent since the start of the season in order to provide a fair and level playing field for competition within the context of the guidance issued by the EIHA, Sport England, DCMS and Public Health England. Where appropriate, the EIHA will also take account of guidance issued by the various home nations involved in cross-border competition.

Guidance

On January 5th 2022, the EIHA published to clubs information pulling together various pieces of information from the Rules of Competition and government guidance. Whilst not new information, the guidance pulled together previous recommendations into a single list outlining clearly policies on mask wearing, Covid testing and other measures that are clearly contained within either previous EIHA information or guidance from the wider sport sector.

The EIHA will apply the active guidance from government at the time of any decision and any variation in decision will be based against this guidance. An example of this is the changing period on isolation which had gone from ten to seven and now to five days in some circumstances which does not update any information provided by the EIHA as the organisation ultimately follows the updated government guidance.

Cancelling games

In relation to the decisions on cancelling games, it is ultimately a club decision and then the club must follow a process to enact the cancellation as outlined in the Rules of Competition. The rule states:

5.3 Should a team fail to complete a fixture without reasonable excuse as determined by the appropriate discipline panel then they shall be fined up to £5,000 and be docked 3 points in that competition.

5.4. Should there be a claim that a game is not able to played on an agreed date due to weather conditions, ice rink breakdown, or other unprecedented circumstances, the teams involved should follow the procedure outlined. The games should not be called off formally until 24 hours prior to the game unless it is absolutely certain there will be no remedy to the difficulties. Failure to follow the established procedure will result in a 5-0 forfeit and a reduction of 3 points.

Following cancellation, a club is then required to supply evidence to the EIHA to justify a cancellation and request a rearrangement of a fixture. The rule states:

5.4.1. Teams should prepare evidence of the nature of the cancellation and submit to the relevant contact for review. Other information may also be requested or used by a panel as they require including but not limited to, the participation of other teams or activities taking place at the venue, the travel been undertaken by other teams who may be using the same routes in cases of inclement weather or other such measures as would be deemed reasonable.

Within the update on 5th January, further guidance was provided to clubs as to the evidence needed for cancellation due to Covid which has been consistent in terms of evidence requested for cancelled games. Ultimately this is information relating to the players isolating due to having tested positive to Covid or being required to isolate by law. Further guidance was also issued to ensure clubs were in line with GDPR when submitting information.

The discipline policy states the following for games that are not played:

13.2. Any Team failing to start or complete a fixture in any circumstances:

13.2.1. May be charged with Misconduct and bringing the game into disrepute.

13.2.2. Will forfeit the relevant game 5-0 in favour of the non- offending team.

13.2.3. May be fined up to £5,000.

13.2.4. May be held liable to indemnify the non-offending Team and the venue operator/rink in respect of any expenses, losses, or costs incurred because of the offending Team’s actions.

13.2.5. May be expelled from the league to which the offending Team is affiliated.

13.3. Any Persons (whether Players, Officials, Coaches, or any other connected party) involved may also be charged with Misconduct and bringing the game into disrepute.

Some clubs have cited that their decision was to mutually cancel a fixture and therefore the fixture should be rearranged. Whilst all clubs were sympathetic to the position of opposition clubs, no fixtures were mutually cancelled and all opposition teams were willing for the fixtures to go ahead. Should it have been evidenced that a fixture was mutually cancelled, the rules of competition state:

5.4.2. Teams are not able to mutually agree to postpone a fixture between them and, should this take place, a fixture would be awarded 0-0 with no points for either team.

Multiple clubs have contacted the EIHA over the first four months of the season on whether a game may be cancelled and postponed with all clubs receiving consistent information that a postponement will only be approved should a club demonstrate it was not able to meet the minimum bench strength. This requirement is consistent whether due to injuries, suspensions or Covid isolation.

All clubs prior to 18th December and after 19th December have all been able to meet this requirement.

The EIHA will not comment on specific cases as isolation information has not been provided to the EIHA for public use and therefore would not be considered a legitimate use of this information. However, it is noteworthy that cancellation requests from clubs in some circumstances have been received with no positive cases and, based on government guidance, only one person isolating.

The EIHA will continue to use this information, and the supplied evidence by clubs, following the due process to evaluate the evidence impartially to inform any decision making. Where a game cannot proceed safely in line with government guidance, a game will be rescheduled.

For fairness and consistency, this is the reason for operating in line with the minimum bench strength and the EIHA had already responded to support clubs meeting this with its dispensation process which has successfully supported over 500 players across the sport in continuing their development by playing at a higher level.

It has also been cited that games should have been cancelled due to rising cases. However, the EIHA again is following government guidance which advised it was safe for games to proceed in spite of a case rate of circa 77K cases per day over the cancelled game period which rose to over 182K cases per day where teams then recommenced playing fixtures having previously cited the case rate as a reason for cancellation.

Sanctions for cancelling games

Based on the evidence of clubs for games on the 18th and 19th December, it was determined that clubs could have iced a team, in line with government guidance and therefore a number of automatic sanctions came into effect. These were not optional under the Rules of Competition and whilst harsh, does also provide a differential that those who play and may lose a game by a larger margin than 5 goals are not at more of a disadvantage than a team who chooses to cancel a fixture.

Two optional sanctions were applied to the fixtures. A fine which was graded based on the number of offences of a team starting at a nominal fee and going up per offence which will be applied to all sanctions for clubs. The second was the awarding of costs which, given some clubs would incur costs due to the decision to cancel outside of government and NGB guidance, was felt appropriate.

Appeal

Raiders NIHL National submitted an appeal to the outcome of the discipline decision as referenced within the original press release and this was confirmed last week. The appeal outcome outlined that the appeal was rejected “on the grounds that the correct procedures were not conducted in order for a game to be cancelled”.

It has been confirmed that the specific reason for the procedural issue was that the team, at the point of the game, was able to meet the minimum roster requirements based on government guidelines even taking account of both isolation of players and pre-existing injuries. This was not included in the original notification to the Raiders and their subsequent PR, which was scheduled to go out prior to receiving further feedback from the Appeals panel.

Communicating discipline decisions

The EIHA will be making amendments to how discipline decisions are published to clubs and subsequently to the wider ice hockey community. This will include consultation on:

• An 8-day embargo period on public announcements following a notification being received thus allowing formal communications to be agreed or for an appeal to be submitted.
• Where an appeal is submitted, no actions are taken other than an announcement that following a Discipline Panel decision, an appeal had been submitted.
• At the end of an appeals process, an 8-day embargo period on public announcements following notification of the appeal outcome or until a formal announcement is made by the EIHA giving at least 24 hours notice to a club prior to a formal press release.

Following the consultation, the communications process will be written into the Rules of Competition.

Some feedback was also given to the EIHA on anonymous quotes being used within the previous press release. In order to protect individual volunteers involved in making difficult decisions at times, quotes within press releases relating to Discipline will continue to be anonymous to protect them from abuse, either online or in person.

Other comments have also been made about changing the rules after the fact to give more leniency in the circumstances. This would be fundamentally against the notion of fair competition and open challenge from other clubs who, had the rules being different at the start of the season, may have made different choices themselves in other fixtures where they only had a minimum bench available or who could claim disadvantage due to the rules not being applied as written.

Following feedback, EIHA Director Andrew Miller came forward to say: “The decisions taken by our Discipline and Appeals panels have been extremely difficult and in some cases divisive. Their role in our sport is to consider the case made, the evidence presented to them and to evaluate it objectively against our rules and regulations to ensure fairness and consistency is maintained.

“The EIHA has set out some reforms in how we communicate with our clubs and the wider community which is important to ensure that we have trust in our sport. Whilst some will not agree with the decisions of the panels, the EIHA has set out the way decisions have been taken to be transparent and how we can better keep people informed.”