2019/20 Soccer Thread

In Portugal, they cancelled the lower leagues, other sports even, but they're still undecided with the 1st league.
Equality is overrated.

Indeed.

I predict legal challenges all around, if the Premier League is either authorized to proceed or if the Govt chooses not to prevent PL football resuming, but puts the kibosh on other sports doing the same.

I was an irrational optimist when it came to sports returning.

My logic was just there's so much money to be made and or lost.

I guess one tricky part is the games are already technically sold depending on the tv rights. Not sure what kind of money the league's have to default on if any.

I just assumed these leagues had the incentive + brains to pull something together.

jowner wrote:

I just assumed these leagues had the incentive + brains to pull something together.

One of the most challenging issues is testing. Over on the Formula 1 thread, there's a link to this Guardian article about the scale of testing required for a behind-closed-doors F1 race.

Something similar in scale would likely be required for every Premier League weekend (e.g. players & team support staff, officials, media, staff at each venue).

It really is as simple as just testing though. If the testing was up to scale, this wouldn't seem like such an impossibility, and the PL would probably be in the same place Germany is right now, moving concretely towards a restart.

Prederick wrote:

It really is as simple as just testing though. If the testing was up to scale, this wouldn't seem like such an impossibility, and the PL would probably be in the same place Germany is right now, moving concretely towards a restart.

The problem isn't the testing though. The problem is if someone is found to be infected. Then what? everyone in that team goes into quarantine for 2 weeks? Everyone they played against or interacted with goes into quarantine for 2 weeks? all their teammates? just the people they played with/ trained with? If any of that happens the restart is dead as soon as it started.

It's fine so long as everyone tests clean the entire time they take to get through the remaining matches. As soon as someone test positive, it's all over. And don't forget if any player refuses to play, there probably isn't a lot that can be done to stop them.

It's an absolute minefield. Everyone will be watching what happens in Germany now. Or they should be. That'll tell you whether or not the rest of the league will get played, or like in France they are going to call it as is.

As much as I've said the games "have to be played" in the past, I think we've hit a stage now where they are more likely to be called. The clubs, TV companies, the Premier League / FA / National leagues will have to work out what it all means for the money side of things.

I believe Germany has a plan in place for players who test positive, no? I mean, it's going to happen, without question.

Quick check: It's already happening, 10 players tested positive...
Positive Coronavirus Tests Bring Scrutiny to German...

Hard to tell exactly from the article, but it sounds like they'll isolate players who test positive, then just keep testing and isolating.

I think you're spot on Sorbicol.

The current protocol in the UK is that those who have been in contact with a carrier (symptomatic or no) must go in to isolation too... for two weeks.

So if player in Team A tests positive - after full training, but before a match - then everyone they've been in contact with goes into isolation for two weeks. So Team A misses two weeks of the restarted season.

But if the player in Team A tests positive after a match with Team B, then Team A and Team B and all the match officials go in to isolation. So Teams A and B miss two weeks of the restarted season.

In either scenario, the season is over, I think.

Godzilla Blitz wrote:

I believe Germany has a plan in place for players who test positive, no? I mean, it's going to happen, without question.

Quick check: It's already happening, 10 players tested positive...
Positive Coronavirus Tests Bring Scrutiny to German...

Hard to tell exactly from the article, but it sounds like they'll isolate players who test positive, then just keep testing and isolating.

I suspect that the players will knock that on the head - they’ll refuse to play, once more than a few cases have come to light.

I’m very surprised German have let games go head to be honest.

I'd think the Bundesliga players would have approved the plan, whatever that may be.

Another consideration is that the tests in practice are estimated to be 68-80% effective, so if 10 players tested positive, most likely they missed a couple of players who have coronavirus but didn't test positive.

It does seem like a test-trace-isolate strategy except they're skipping the whole "isolate known contacts of people who are infected" step.

Be interesting to see how it works out. It feels like there will be lots of eyes on this from other sports and leagues to see how they do.

So are we all Bayern Munich fans now, or what?

Mixolyde wrote:

So are we all Bayern Munich fans now, or what?

Have I recently been struck in the head with a tire iron?

Mixolyde wrote:

So are we all Bayern Munich fans now, or what?

Other than Alphonso Davies, no.

That started well

Dynamo Dresden team placed in 14 day quarantine a week before Bundesliga restart. I know they are a second tier team but it doesn’t bode well.

Also in the UK

Brighton and Hove Albion announce 3rd player tests positive for Covid-19.

Some speculation here (unwarranted) that Brighton are only announcing this as they want the league to be voided this season. In pretty much every other scenario, they are going to be relegated.

Sorbicol wrote:

That started well

Dynamo Dresden team placed in 14 day quarantine a week before Bundesliga restart. I know they are a second tier team but it doesn’t bode well.

Interesting. To clarify, they put their own team in isolation. Like Brighton, they are at the bottom of the league, so another club that would benefit most from the season being voided.

The Bundesliga is officially back! And Erling Haaland scored the first post-COVID-19 goal in all of Europe's top leagues, fittingly.

Coronavirus football: FC Seoul apologises for 'sex dolls' in stands

There isn't a font big enough for the LOL i'd like to write.

The Scots have officially pulled the plug.

Celtic are champions, so nothing really changed.

Prederick wrote:

Coronavirus football: FC Seoul apologises for 'sex dolls' in stands

There isn't a font big enough for the LOL i'd like to write.

Hahaha. There are so many layers of incompetent (or lying) in that story.

So, anybody been watching some Bundesliga?

I watched half a match from last weekend. It was nice. Only thing that bothered me is the pitch didn't seem as well mic'd up as I'm used to. That was weirder than no crowd noise.

Roke wrote:

So, anybody been watching some Bundesliga?

I watched half a match from last weekend. It was nice. Only thing that bothered me is the pitch didn't seem as well mic'd up as I'm used to. That was weirder than no crowd noise.

I watched a little but neither match seemed very competitive. I also don't care about Bundesliga. The lack of fans definitely takes something away. I'm hoping that when the EPL returns, I'll be able to really enjoy it.

The Bundesliga is looking very smart in the sense that it's the only thing on, and has to be getting extra exposure from that (but also the bad kind of exposure, heh).

I watched some last weekend and this weekend. It is good to have some live sports back but it is weird watching with no fans, makes it feel like a college game with all silence and voice echos.

The piped in crowd noise for this Bayern v Borussia game is nice. At first I did not even think about it then realized it in the back ground. Makes the game feel more intense or real I like it.

The Premier League will restart (behind closed doors) on the 17th June. These will be the 2 remaining games in hand: Villa v Sheffield United and Man City v Arsenal. A full weekend fixture list will then be played on the 19th June to 21st June and so on and so forth until the league is complete.

So far, out of 2752 tests 12 people (players & staff) have tested positive since training resumed earlier this month.

The weekend tv schedule sat/sun of 5 straight back to back each day starting at 5am pst going thru 1pm pst looks tasty. Smart move to maximize exposure to maybe pick up a few more fans in USA.

Serie A now set for a June 20 return. Looks like Ligue 1 will be the odd one out.

That said, with all the focus on the top leagues, this whole thing is probably going to wipe out parts of the lower leagues in every country.

Like, how many football league clubs do we think will survive this out of 92? My immediate guess would be to put the over/under at 70, and that's just league clubs. Non-league clubs are absolutely screwed.

Man, I want to watch soccer, but the Bundesliga is such an uncompetitive league that I can't get interested.

With all of the big European teams and leagues trying to increase their profile in the United States, could that ever inspire them adopting any rules to aid competitiveness?

I do understand that pro/rel tends to make stakeholders dislike parity.

Fedaykin98 wrote:

Man, I want to watch soccer, but the Bundesliga is such an uncompetitive league that I can't get interested.

With all of the big European teams and leagues trying to increase their profile in the United States, could that ever inspire them adopting any rules to aid competitiveness?

I do understand that pro/rel tends to make stakeholders dislike parity.

Such as? I'm not being provocative here, I'm just wondering.

the problem is football teams across Europe that have deeply invested fan bases that are quite happy with the status quo. Anyone telling them "yeah, this is too boring. Let's bring in some American ideas!" is likely to be on the receiving end of internet witch hunt levels of abuse. and some of those fans aren't people you really want to mess with.

Most football fans across Europe couldn't a flying f*ck about what Americans think of their leagues (No offence intended there!). For sure the financial power of the most successful team is currently a stumbling block to success for teams not so fortunate, but then again you do occasionally get a Leicester City, a Wolfsburg or a Valencia that come in and shake things up. Most European fans would rather see that I think that some artificial contrivance to make the teams more competitive.

Basically, it's a cultural thing.