WIDNES Vikings have been given a rent holiday to help the club deal with the financial impact of the cancellation of its 2020 season.

The Vikings will not have to pay rent on the Halton Council-owned DCBL Stadium after the RFL scrapped the rest of this year’s Championship in light of the coronavirus crisis.

The club also pulled out of the Challenge Cup earlier this year.

The council’s decision to give the Vikings a rent holiday will provide some relief to a club that has endured a challenging period in recent years including relegation from Super League and a brush with financial collapse.

In a statement on its website, the club said the loss of the 2020 season “could now jeopardise all of the hard work of the club and our dedicated supporters in order to survive administration and reach the point we were at heading into this campaign”.

The rent holiday, an extension of a policy offered to all Halton Council’s commercial tenants that had been unable to trade during lockdown, will be the second time in two years that the council has come to the Vikings’ aid.

When the club entered administration in February 2019, it was revealed that the council was its biggest creditor with the Vikings owing £350,000 to the local authority.

As the Vikings’ financial problems deepened, the council offered to reschedule the debt and also proposed a raft of measures designed to reduce the cost of playing at the stadium.

A spokesperson for the council said this week: “The council has taken steps to support tenants who would normally pay rent to the council for the use of council buildings but have been unable to carry out their business due to lockdown.

“As a tenant of the stadium, Widnes Vikings have been able to take advantage of this arrangement.

“This arrangement has been removed for tenants who have been able to resume their business in council premises as the lockdown has eased.

“However, lockdown remains in place for some tenants. The council’s support remains in place for tenants who have been unable to resume use of council premise, such as Widnes Vikings.”

Now, the club is once again considering its financial position.

The statement on the Vikings’ website added: “Over the coming days we will be assessing various options with regards to the costs and implications of reimbursing our Season Ticket holders.  “This will then inform our decisions on future planning with regards to our budget and depending on the findings of this we may need to incur debt in the form of loans to meet this unforeseen cost.

“Given the events of 2019 this is not necessarily a position we want to be in, given that we currently have no debt and have taken out no loans, as incurring debt will have several knock-on effects in regards to our budget and recruitment plans.”