Flooding caused travel disruption, closed schools and submerged homes in central and southern England on Monday after more than a month’s worth of rain fell in 24 hours in some areas. The London fire brigade said it received hundreds of calls about flooding-related incidents, including people needing to be rescued from cars and homes, while a huge sinkhole appeared on the pitch at AFC Wimbledon’s stadium, causing matches to be postponed. After a weekend of thunderstorms and torrential downpours, the Met Office issued an amber weather alert for rain until 9pm on Monday in an area including Milton Keynes, Oxford, Reading, Bath and Gloucester, meaning flooding and travel disruption was expected. A much wider area, covering most of England and south-east Wales, was under a yellow warning for heavy rain until midnight. Many places were predicted to receive between 60mm and 80mm of rain, with up to 120mm expected in some areas. “It all depends on where, and if, the weather system responsible for the heavy rain stalls and pivots,” said the Met Office chief meteorologist, Frank Saunders. Some areas received a month’s worth of rain on Sunday and into the early hours of the morning. Woburn in Bedfordshire recorded 116mm of rain up to 5am on Monday, with other sites recording close to 100mm. The Environment Agency issued 22 warnings for expected flooding and 86 alerts for possible flooding, with most affected areas concentrated in central and southern England. These included Atherstone in Warwickshire, Leighton Buzzard and Luton in Bedfordshire, and parts of London including Wimbledon and South Ruislip. Some schools in Bedfordshire were closed on Monday as a result of flooded buildings and roads, and services on the London Overground and some tube lines were suspended. The London fire brigade said its 999 control officers had taken about 350 calls related to flooding, and firefighters attended incidents including people trapped in cars and homes, and flooding in underground stations, roads and buildings. The Carabao Cup game between AFC Wimbledon and Newcastle United scheduled for Tuesday night was postponed as a result of severe flooding and what appeared to be a large sinkhole on the pitch at Cherry Red Records Stadium. AFC Wimbledon said the stadium would be closed until further notice and that a home game scheduled for 1 October had also been postponed. Homes in the Midlands and south-west England were left without power after a number of outages caused by the weather. Pictures showed shops and cars underwater on Sunday in towns including Dunstable in Bedfordshire and Hitchin in Hertfordshire, while a number of homes in Grendon, a village in Northamptonshire, were flooded on Sunday night. Jon Sayles said 60cm (2ft) of water had entered his home from 9pm, causing extensive damage. “I was in bed as I’d decided to have an early night. A neighbour called me to tell me what was happening, so I went to have a look and saw the water. It was unbelievable,” he told PA Media. “I’m still clearing up and had no sleep last night.” Police in Aldridge, near Walsall, evacuated customers from a Wetherspoon’s pub that was struck by lightning on Saturday. A fundraiser has been launched to help a 79-year-old woman in Stoke-on-Trent whose roof caught fire when it was struck on the same day. The Met Office predicted a reprieve from the wet weather on Tuesday but said heavy rainfall could return later in the week, while temperatures are likely to drop to below-average levels for the time of year across the country because of northerly winds. The Met Office meteorologist Jonathan Vautrey said: “Parts of Scotland will certainly see that already by Monday and into Tuesday, with temperatures slipping down into the low teens in places, but that cool and cold air will eventually reach many areas of the UK by the time we head throughout the rest of the week.”