Footballers and CoronaVirus

[Gangster Octopus]

Barnet - the first of many?

[ursus arctos]

Snake, that is certainly a reasonable approach, though I do wonder if the particular situation of this season's Premier League would make rights holders prefer truncating this season in the hope of a more competitive contest next time.

[imp]

Apologies if someone's mentioned this already - one possibility would be to finish this season sometime before the end of the year, then move to calendar year seasons from 2021. Play, say, February to November with a month's summer break for international tournaments, or move international tournaments permanently to winter. There had been talk about doing this anyway at some point.

It would also be a perfect time for reform to reduce the fixture list. All top flights - 18 teams only. In England and Scotland (France is already one step ahead here), bin the League Cup, no more replays in the FA Cup, with home advantage always to the lower-placed team. Works well in Germany, where even with the system above teams complain about there being too many games if they're in Europe.

While we're at it. A European-wide cap on salaries and transfer fees (decided by an independent body?), the abolition of agents (I foresee a ceremony involving a large fire-pit and cheering crowds), the equal distribution of tv money across all four divisions, the return of the European Cup and the Uefa Cup to replace the Champions League and the Europa League, and me in charge of the whole fucking thing to make sure everyone complies.

[sw2borshch]

I can't give a definitive answer but the precedent is the 1939-40 season (three games played before war broke out). I've consulted my Glasper* and there's a note to the effect that it would have been the league debut of one player who turned out for Boro on 2 September but it wasn't because the season was curtailed and he went elsewhere after the war and didn't play for Boro again. He doesn't appear in the list of player appearances section. So, presumably, everything would be scrubbed out.

* Middlesbrough: A Complete Record

Every home should have a Glasper, although I have a Glasper & Kershaw.

[Diable Rouge]

Blaise Matuidi confirmed now:

https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/51935585

[Antepli Ejderha]

One significant complication (which Janik has noted) is that contracts expire in June

May in Turkey.

[Antepli Ejderha]

John Mikel Obi leaves Turkish club after expressing coronavirus fears - http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/africa/51939149

Hopefully this will prompt some action but I doubt it. Sport, and particularly football, is used as a distraction from real life hence the need for it to continue.

[Felicity, I guess so]

I see that Mason Mount decided that the best way to follow Chelsea's instructions to self isolate was to have a kick about in the park with Declan Rice.

This makes me think of the Father Daymo episode of Father Ted

[imp]

I'd just like to thank the two people who 'liked' my last rant on this thread. I was completely blanking yesterday for my weekly Soccer America column and wrote to them saying they should probably rest me for a few weeks. This morning, seeing those two likes was enough to motivate me to expand the post into 1100 words of waffle calling for wholesale football reforms in the post-corona world. This board is still a great place, 20 years and counting (shouldn't OTF be having some kind of 20th. birthday celebration around now?).

[hobbes]

Well done Chelsea!

Chelsea open up Stamford Bridge hotel to NHS staff amid coronavirus pandemic

• NHS staff will be able to stay at Millennium Hotel for free
• Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich will cover costs

[Ray de Galles]

I see that Mason Mount decided that the best way to follow Chelsea's instructions to self isolate was to have a kick about in the park with Declan Rice.

Given the avalanche of news at the moment, I only saw the headline for this story and consequently have spent a few days thinking Mount had a kickaround with Pat Rice.

[Ray de Galles]

John Mikel Obi leaves Turkish club after expressing coronavirus fears - http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/africa/51939149

Hopefully this will prompt some action but I doubt it. Sport, and particularly football, is used as a distraction from real life hence the need for it to continue.

I didn't even realise that Turkish football had carried on, albeit behind closed doors.

I'm surprised Sky or BT haven't made a bid for the rights as a stopgap. Though it wouldn't have stopped me cancelling them as I did yesterday.

[ursus arctos]

BeIN have the rights here, and have been showing as many matches as they can

[imp]

So how successful have the commentators been about sounding excited at events on the field in the Turkish league behind closed doors at a time of international crisis?

[ursus arctos]

Not very

Though the fact that they are calling the matches off a monitor in Miami or Qatar doesn't help.

It may be my mind playing tricks, but the closed door matches seem even more ridiculous in large and well appointed grounds. While it still is unnerving to watch one from the provinces, it is less so than a fixture like Galatasaray-Besiktas.

[Antepli Ejderha]

I've actually watched a Turkish Süper Lig match that was played behind closed doors, Bursaspor vs Gaziantepspor in 2007 iirc. It was a punishment for crowd disturbances from a previous match.

We'd already booked tickets and hotels to go to Bursa and were on the ferry from Istanbul to Bursa when I read about it in the sports paper. On the day of the game I put on my scarf, hat and shirt and told my wife we're going to the stadium to see if being a foreigner might help me get in.

We met the journalists from the local TV station and I got interviewed and then told to wait and they'd see what they could do.

Just before kick off doors opened and we were ushered in, past the players as they queued up before walking on the pitch. A couple of officials from the TFF asked who we were the Gaziantep delegation said I was with them, they then pointed to my wife and asked who she was, again hurried shouts of she's with us and we were ushered into the area where the players watched the match, the injured stars and the youth team.

It was a very strange experience, you could hear every kick and shout and it felt like a training session might. It finished one one but I still remember the sound of the ball hitting the crossbar from a free kick.

[ursus arctos]

Remarkable story

The ambient sound on the matches I've seen is exactly as you describe.

[Sporting]

I think I once started a thread about games played behind closed doors, can't search now.

[ursus arctos]

You did

https://www.onetouchfootball.com/for...d-closed-doors

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

Given the avalanche of news at the moment, I only saw the headline for this story and consequently have spent a few days thinking Mount had a kickaround with Pat Rice.

Reminds me of seeing a headline announcing to the world that "posh spice is going out with man utd's david." And thinking that david may really was having a golden 96-97

[Nefertiti2]

https://twitter.com/BenJolly9/status/1240326059695972352?s=20

[Sporting]

Excellent.

[Satchmo Distel]

Euro 2020 play-off date now being tentatively suggested as sometime in June 2020, which is just foolish and won't happen. Even if football is back by June, leagues will surely have to finish first.

[Gangster Octopus]

Nowt before May...

[Antepli Ejderha]

The Turkish FA has now suspended the league.