Oxford United’s FA Carlsberg Trophy game against Woking at the Kassam Stadium will be officially called off on Friday.

That formality comes with a pitch inspection by a local referee.

The Football Association allow clubs to get referees in two days earlier when the opposition have a long way to travel, but that obviously isn’t the case with the Surrey side.

However, one wonders why they should be so rigid in that regulation when the weather is as bad as it has been this week.

Indeed, United fans will be wondering when they will next see the team play, if the weather forecasts prove correct.

This FA Trophy second-round tie will be put back to the scheduled replay date, which is next Tuesday, but if the snow forecast on Sunday arrives there will then again be the formality of another pitch inspection on Monday to call that off.

It would then be put back to the scheduled third-round date, Saturday January 30, meaning that the Blue Square Premier match at home to Wrexham that day has to be postponed.

It’s all pointing to a fixture backlog, but it’s the same for all clubs.

Even ignoring the snow that is around at the moment, frost has set into the pitch at the Kassam Stadium so much that it would appear to need several “warm” days for that to come out.

Such temperatures seem highly unlikely for at least a week.

Oxford United and the stadium company offices have been forced to close for two days this week because of the bad weather.

And United general manager and secretary Mick Brown says that, for many clubs, even undersoil heating is not going to give them any sort of help them in getting games on this weekend.

“Even if you’ve got undersoil heating, you still can’t play the game if surrounding areas are horrendous,” he said.

“That’s the problem Arsenal had this week and a few other clubs will encounter the same this weekend.”