Great save? Lower league clubs mull early kick-offs to cut energy bills

With budgets always tight some smaller football clubs are looking to offset their soaring power costs

Shrewsbury Town's fans had long since filed out of the Montgomery Waters Meadow stadium after the defender Chey Dunkley had scored an injury-time winner against Exeter, when Brian Caldwell looked angrily skyward. The League One club's chief executive was unimpressed to see the ground's floodlights still burning bright.

Caldwell is among the football executives trying to limit the financial pain from huge energy bills. Faced with an even bigger surge in his annual costs, Caldwell was forced to settle for a 100,000 increase, to 180,000, when signing a new energy contract in April. It's a massive dent in our finances. Football clubs are not normal businesses, they're set up to break even and put the money you can into the playing budget," he said.