Whitehaven AFC have held their hands up to the “genuine mistake” which has led to their expulsion from this season’s Fred Conway Cumberland Cup.

The west Cumbrian club have been thrown out of the county senior cup after it turned out they fielded a player who had already played for another team in the 2024/25 competition.

It happened in Whitehaven’s second-round win over holders Workington Reds.

The Cumberland Football Association on Monday announced that Whitehaven had breached Rule 6 over player eligibility.

The county FA said the decision was subject to appeal but Whitehaven say they accept the situation and will not be contesting it.

Whitehaven chairman Luke Johnston told the News & Star that it had been a “complete oversight” on the club’s part.

“We've co-operated fully with the investigation and we support the decision – we won't be appealing,” he said.

“It's a complete oversight in that we signed a player who came from Whitehaven Miners, and we’d been completely in the dark that this player had played in the first round of the cup.

“The player wasn't really aware of the rules, didn't really give it a second thought, and it’s an oversight on our side as well, us having had a bye in the first round.

“We were made aware after the Workington match. We were contacted by the Cumberland FA to ask for our team and we fully co-operated – at no point did we try to cover it up or anything like that.”

Whitehaven were contacted on Monday by Cumberland FA chief executive Ben Snowdon, who informed the club that they would be expelled from this season’s competition, according to the cup rules.

“I accepted that and apologised on behalf of the club, and I've made the Cumberland FA aware that we're not going to be appealing, because we respect that those are the rules,” Johnston added.

Whitehaven had defeated cup holders Workington 4-3 on penalties after a 3-3 draw on November 12, in what seemed to be a successful night for the club.

“We really wanted it and the lads were really happy with that win,” said Johnston. “So it is really disappointing but, as I say, we respect the decision.

“I suppose we just learn to be a little bit more organised. At grassroots level, we’re all volunteers – every single one of the people involved with the first team, whether that’s the players, coaches or myself as chairman, all have full-time jobs and inevitably mistakes happen on the back of that.

“We have to learn from our mistakes and we're all going to get together and look at our process for registering players and selecting players and things like that.

“We will look at more of a joined-up approach to ensure it doesn't happen again.”

Johnston said Whitehaven will return to the county cup next season keen to make their mark on it.

“It is a big competition for us and, given the roots of the cup, and especially with it being named after the gentleman that was Fred Conway, it makes us even more determined to put on a show,” the chairman added.

“As a whole, we've not done badly over the past few years in the county cup. We're even more determined to give it our all next year and we're going to focus our attention now on the rest of the league season.”

Whitehaven will focus on their efforts in the West Lancashire League Premier Division, under recently-appointed manager Carl Short.

“Carl’s a UEFA A-Licence coach and he’s got big plans for the team,” Johnston said.

“He was our coach before becoming manager, and the club is supporting him massively at the moment with everything he’s doing.

“He’s probably one of the most qualified coaches in the county, and he’s certainly the only coach in our club who has a UEFA A badge.

“We’ve not performed the best in the league so far, we’ve had some players out with injuries and other different things, but we’ve got a few games coming up over the next few weeks that we think we can win.

“We've had some players return from other clubs that had left at the end of last season and hopefully we can make some good progress.”

The quarter-final draw of the Fred Conway Cumberland Cup is due to be made tonight. Workington look set to return to the competition to take Whitehaven's place, although the Cumberland FA said any decision will be made after a seven-day period has passed or following any appeal.