Matches Reduced Season.

[MiddleBartonYellow]

Looking more likely in my view.
My suggestion would be every team plays every other team once ( 23 Games ). Then the league splits in two. The top 12 then play each other again, in reverse fixtures ( 11 Games ) to decide promotion and play offs. The bottom 12 would then do the same to decide relegation. Suspend the league until February. Not ideal but a fairer way than ppg.

Unless anyone has a better idea.

 

[MC Yellow]

Looking more likely in my view.
My suggestion would be every team plays every other team once ( 23 Games ). Then the league splits in two. The top 12 then play each other again, in reverse fixtures ( 11 Games ) to decide promotion and play offs. The bottom 12 would then do the same to decide relegation. Suspend the league until February. Not ideal but a fairer way than ppg.

Unless anyone has a better idea.

Yep... just cancel the season and start again in August

 

[Marked Ox]

Find out measures involved in EFL's new Covid protocols

THE EFL has said it will be reviewing and further strengthening its coronavirus protocols.

www.oxfordmail.co.uk

It's alright everybody, the FL are on the case....

 

[MC Yellow]

I can just see more teams having to postpone and isolate..

Fixture backlog will be horrendous. Throw in some snow and ice and we’ll be way behind schedule.

 

[Wandering Yellow]

Yep... just cancel the season and start again in August

Yep, and we can pretend this season and the Swindon game never happened!

 

[MC Yellow]

Yep, and we can pretend this season and the Swindon game never happened!

yeah, all results null and void . Every cloud and all that.

 

[Sheik djibouti]

I can just see more teams having to postpone and isolate..

Fixture backlog will be horrendous. Throw in some snow and ice and we’ll be way behind schedule.

Soon to be a thing of the past - Thank Christ for global warming....that's what I reckon!

 

[werthersoriginal]

I’d be happy enough just playing say 30 matches with no promotions or relegations, apart from the fact that Wycombe would then get another season in the championship!

 

[RyanioBirdio]

There are talks behind the scenes across all levels of the game about having to stop, in the form of a January ‘circuit breaker’, but the leagues won’t do it unless the government makes them by law. For now. As soon as the next round of mandatory testing happens in early January, and the number of positive tests across all clubs becomes apparent, the plug might be yanked out of the wall.

Points on the board sooner rather than later could be critical.

 

[tonyw]

The Premier League is going to fight against a circuit breaker, and especially against a season cancellation, with everything they've got.
So much of their income comes from their TV deal, and they will do anything to not have to give any of that back again this season. The fact that there's no fans in the stadia is financially less relevant to them (and we all know that finances are what they care about above all else).

For the Football League though? Every game they play without fans is a game where the club is losing money. And you obviously can't have fans in when the region is in lockdown. Financially, it would probably make more sense for them to cancel the season and put everyone back on furlough in the hope that we're all vaccinated and we can start again in August and have a normal season.

But if Covid numbers calm down and fans can get back in the grounds in February - then MiddleBarton's suggestion looks an excellent one.

 

[werthersoriginal]

There are talks behind the scenes across all levels of the game about having to stop, in the form of a January ‘circuit breaker’, but the leagues won’t do it unless the government makes them by law. For now. As soon as the next round of mandatory testing happens in early January, and the number of positive tests across all clubs becomes apparent, the plug might be yanked out of the wall.

Points on the board sooner rather than later could be critical.

They wouldn’t do promotion and relegation with only half the season played, it would just be annulled.

 

[Scotchegg]

The Premier League is going to fight against a circuit breaker, and especially against a season cancellation, with everything they've got.
So much of their income comes from their TV deal, and they will do anything to not have to give any of that back again this season. The fact that there's no fans in the stadia is financially less relevant to them (and we all know that finances are what they care about above all else).

For the Football League though? Every game they play without fans is a game where the club is losing money. And you obviously can't have fans in when the region is in lockdown. Financially, it would probably make more sense for them to cancel the season and put everyone back on furlough in the hope that we're all vaccinated and we can start again in August and have a normal season.

But if Covid numbers calm down and fans can get back in the grounds in February - then MiddleBarton's suggestion looks an excellent one.

Arguably, the clubs will lose less money whilst playing behind doors than they will with restricted fans in attendance. With no other revenue streams at the ground we receive no more money for a season ticket holder who turns up at the ground than we do for them watching on iFollow. However, we need to pay for turnstyle staff, stewarding, police and first aid/medical providers. So in the short term it makes sense to keep the season ticking over as best as we can, unless of course, the welfare of players and staff is at risk.

 

[RyanioBirdio]

They wouldn’t do promotion and relegation with only half the season played, it would just be annulled.

Absolutely no chance.

 

[MiddleBartonYellow]

A shortened season is more likely, a cancellation of the season won’t happen.
There has to be a resolution one way or another.

 

[ttg17]

SURELY the EFL put some kind of official guideline in place before this season started that authoritatively laid out what would happen in the event of a truncated season? The fiasco in the summer only came about because it had to be decided in real time how to establish final standings, I can't believe even they would leave it to chance like that again.

 

[RyanioBirdio]

A shortened season is more likely, a cancellation of the season won’t happen.
There has to be a resolution one way or another.

The Premier League insists on the ‘integrity’ of the EFL being maintained, and if that doesn’t happen the drawbridge will be pulled up and they’ll refuse to be a part of the English game anymore. It’s really that simple. They can do what they want - the entire English sport is dependent on the brand more than ever. The season cannot and will not be scrapped, especially after numerous months of competition has been played. There will be promoted and relegated teams by hook or by crook.

The leagues must be waiting until after they’ve finally agreed that Championship salary cap to get around to sorting out the details of exactly how the season is curtailed in the event that it can’t be completed. I wonder how that’s going?!

 

[Essexyellows]

We could be in for the longest season in history.
Circuit breaker wipes out January.
Season restarts mid-Feb with some catch up and some games still postponed finishing eventually sometime in July/Aug 2021 after play offs etc.

 

[RyanioBirdio]

We could be in for the longest season in history.
Circuit breaker wipes out January.
Season restarts mid-Feb with some catch up and some games still postponed finishing eventually sometime in July/Aug 2021 after play offs etc.

Too many clubs in the Championship and even a few in L1 will have players participating in the already delayed Euros. I can’t see them doing anything other than finding the most insane way imaginable to ‘complete’ the season by the end of May.

Perhaps instead of football matches they’ll allow squads to settle things in the form of tug of war, Mario kart and my personal favourite, the board game Operation.

 

[holdsteady]

The paint pot Zenith data systems reserve and under 8 shield (or whatever it’s called nowadays) final from last season still hasn’t been played or scrapped yet (the football league haven’t refunded fans tickets yet so I assume they mean to play it) and has no date to be played.

Gives you a bit of an idea of the absolute clueless loons who run the FL, whatever they do will be a bit shambolic though.

 

[Marked Ox]

The paint pot Zenith data systems reserve and under 8 shield (or whatever it’s called nowadays) final from last season still hasn’t been played or scrapped yet (the football league haven’t refunded fans tickets yet so I assume they mean to play it) and has no date to be played.

Gives you a bit of an idea of the absolute clueless loons who run the FL, whatever they do will be a bit shambolic though.

Delay it again, play all remaining games except the final as pre-season games (so August/September possibly) and 3 finals on the same day next season, so sometime in 2022. Doesn't matter if the same team plays in more than one (or all) as fringe/youth players are used anyway.