Little under a week ago, a statement was read before the House by the Foreign Secretary that England would be withdrawing from the World Cup.

This is an idea I did not support when it came to being voted on by Cabinet and I still do not, even moreso now that FIFA has announced the punishment for the FA because of the withdrawal.

I shall put it bluntly here: This has damaged the reputation of English football globally for years to come. Not only that, but the FA will lose out on at least £20 million from FIFA just for competing in the group stage - something that England hasn't failed to do since 1994.

This is money that is desperately needed in English football. Now for the lay person who knows little of English football beyond the Premier League, this may sound like nonsense. But as someone who cares about football clubs at all levels of the game, there is a silent threat lurking in the lower leagues, and this has even managed to reached Championship clubs. The threat of extinction is something that for many football fans has become all too real in recent years, with two Greater Manchester clubs in Bury and Macclesfield Town having dissolved due to financial issues. Just to be clear, both of these clubs have at one time competed in League One, with Bury having been promoted from League Two in their final season before being booted from the EFL.

That same night, another club from Greater Manchester, the historic Bolton Wanderers, who were founding members of the Football League in 1888, were only saved from expulsion at the final hour and have managed to return to League One since. But this isn't an issue that has gone away. Now we see historic clubs like Oldham Athletic (another Greater Manchester club), Derby County and Sheffield Wednesday facing financial difficulties and points deductions from the EFL. For the record, all three of these clubs played multiple seasons in the Premier League in the 1990s, Oldham and Wednesday being two of the original 22 teams who broke away from the Football League to form the Premier League in 1992, and Derby having most recently been in the top-flight in 2008.

This isn't the first financial crisis in football, something similar happened in the mid-2000s and in the late 1980s, the latter of which almost saw my own club, Wolverhampton Wanderers, go under twice during that period. In the mid-00s, we saw a series of clubs in the lower leagues go bust, from Scarborough to Rushden & Diamonds and Halifax Town, and many others faced issues such as Notts County.

Football clubs are the hearts of communities, both metaphorically and literally. Every weekend, thousands of people descend on football grounds up and down the country to watch their team. They go through the turnstiles, have a pint and a balti pie and stand in the terraces and watch a game of football. For most, including myself, it is a tradition, almost like going to church and football is the religion. No matter who you are, young or old, black or white, short or tall, man or woman, cisgender or transgender, gay or straight, able-bodied or disabled, for those 90 minutes you are one with everyone around you. You sing and shout and celebrate together, the only thing binding you is the colours you wear. Now imagine taking away that heart. The passion and the glory.

Unfortunately, this is a lesson we need to learn, and not just in the football community or in the Premier League, but the government as well. For all our talk of supposing communities, little have we done to help these pillars of the community inside the stands of our football grounds and now we can only watch as clubs disappear. Money makes the world go round, or so the sign in the Treasury café says, and that is so true for football clubs, especially those at the bottom, where money can decide whether they can keep the lights on next week, let alone play football.

We must do better, now more than ever, for our clubs and for our communities.