Saturday, 14 March 2020

Could the season be abandoned and save AFCB's blushes?

While the Premier League has suspended the next two weeks of games, there is no guarantee that the situation with COVID-19 will be any better after that period. In fact, it could be a lot worse. So when does the Premier League come to the conclusion that the season can be restarted? It could be difficult even going by advice of the World Health Association. If there remains nine games to be played come May, the Premier League could have an even bigger decision to make.
Take a Spring break lads.
My feeling is that if the resumption of the Premier League does not happen in two weeks time, I get a distinct feeling that the season might be abandoned. That causes lots of problems. There are TV contracts that won't have been fulfilled and while moving a couple of week's fixtures is difficult an inconvenient but possible, moving more and more games is just not going to be workable moving into the summer. 

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Some pundits have been saying award the titles and relegations based on what the tables show now. But that would open up a world of court cases from relegated teams that would have reasonable grounds to say they had not had a full season, and other teams had played different fixtures which may have given them an advantage with the games left to come. There have been suggestions that there are no relegations, the title is awarded to Liverpool and the top six fill the European laces, while the top two Championship clubs are promoted and five teams are relegated form the Premier League in 2020-21. But I just don't see the Premier League wanting more teams - it was always designed as a way of cutting the numbers of clubs in the top flight which used to be 24.

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The only decision I think the Premier League would be able to come to if they couldn't fulfil the fixtures would be to reset the table as it was back in August 2019. No promotions, no relegations, not titles. The season would not have happened. That would be hard on those who were looking to be promoted from lower leagues, but I can't see a fairer way of concluding the football in 2020 if COVID-19 makes it impossible for fixtures to be completed.
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Bournemouth, like Norwich and Aston Villa be saved by an abandoned season. It would be a first, but these clubs earned their right to a full season to retain their status and I am sure it will be in the contracts that they have to play a 38 game season to be relegated. Playing behind closed doors won't do it, because the players and managers are also coming under the influence of this pandemic.

TalkSpot were debating if the season should be scrapped yesterday:

Some fan views (ED - apologies for the four letter words on some tweets)






 Previous post on Cherry Chimes - COVID-19 disrupts football until at least April
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