Sorry, the short answer is no. Our competition is different to others. Once registrations close, there is a significant amount of work that happens behind the scenes to get the season ready. Accepting a late registration isn’t a matter of adding one more player to a team.
Jerseys are ordered immediately after registrations close and take around 4 weeks to manufacture and deliver, pending the status of the manufacturers work load. Ordering an individual jersey after the final export of all players involves redoing additional setup, production and delivery costs.
In our competition, all players must wear their correct team jersey. By allowing players to participate without one (whilst a new jersey is being printed) opens the door to potential "ring-in" players and makes it difficult for us to properly manage team eligibility and non-registered players.
Our final player numbers also need to be provided to our insurer, and additional registrations can potentially affect our insurance requirements and costs.
Once registrations close, the registration portal is closed and the registration funds held in our merchant account are transferred to our main account for reconciliation. To accept a single late registration, the portal needs to be reopened, the additional payment processed and our financial reconciliation updated. Opening the portal involves a web developer as does closing it.
We also export the final team and player information from the registration system to produce our PDF registration checks. Any late additions mean these need to be regenerated and reprinted.
Most importantly, final registrations are what we use to grade teams and prepare the draw. Teams are placed into divisions based on the players registered at the time of grading. If, for example, a strong player is added to a Division 2 team after grading, it could change where that team should be placed. This can mean regrading teams, changing the draw and the cost of reprinting referee cards - affecting not just that team, but potentially every team in that division and any associated byes.
We also pay a membership levy to the sports club. This is invoiced based on final numbers. Any additional players would therfore require a new invoice for the membership levy.
Please keep in mind we are all volunteers with day jobs. We run our comp for the love of sport and the enjoyment it brings the community. For all of these reasons, we need to have a firm registration closing date. Once registrations close, a number of administrative, financial and competition processes are put into motion. Making an exception for one player can mean reopening and redoing several of those processes, and if we make an exception for one, it becomes very difficult to fairly refuse the next.
To summarise, the closing date allows us to finalise teams, grading, jerseys, insurance, finances and the draw, and have everything properly organised and ready for the start of the season.