Coronavirus could prevent Liverpool from winning the Premier League title

[liverpoolsno9]

7 hours ago, Baltar said:

I truly hope we don't follow the example of scum clubs like spuds and Newcastle and furlough the salaries of the non-playing staff. I've truly been sickened by the premier League over this and as a club we need to take the moral stance and defer player salaries in order to pay the club staff. Asking the government to pay for the salaries of staff members while the club pays millionaire footballers their full wage is despicable.

Pretty sure Jurgen wouldn’t allow this. The importance, togetherness and respect he places on every level of the staff is massive. 

[Grinch]

Ashley and Levy, I wouldnt expect anything less from those two despicable cunts. 

[Nuzzer]

10 hours ago, Chip Butty said:

Goalie in and out

Jumpers for goalposts 

[M_B]

5 hours ago, suzy said:

I don’t see the problem with re-starting the League in say October and just no 20/21 season in full, half season, no cups whatever. Not fair to bin this one off when 75% done. 
I like a duckworth Lewis type thing, that would work but I bet it would take ages to thrash out. Might be worth having it in place for the future ?? 

Not sure there will be many clubs left by October. Football has to start again in some form this summer.

[Lee909]

Problem will be sky etc. If there's no football next season they'll kick off to fuck due to loss of subscribers

[El Rojo]

Lots of talk about this Duckworth Lewis. I'm all for bringing in the right young English players, but I won't be convinced until I see his xG ratings, read a few amateur blog posts and see his YouTube compilation.

[Ronnie Whelan]

Was just thinking that there will be two things to delay this season;

(1) it won't be in tasteful to play sport when there are daily death rates in the hundreds (thousands?)

(2) they know that we are two games from winning the title and that would be a health and safety disaster on Merseyside and across the world. Then there will be pockets of celebration replicated in the weeks thereafter by other clubs on a smaller scale.

 

My major concern had always been that this season is completed and now that is essentially the case, I'm good with it coming back in August when hopefully the world is in a much better place to bring normality back into daily life.

[aws]

Test all the managers then settle all the existing games by Sumo wrestling bouts. 

[El Rojo]

4 minutes ago, aws said:

settle all the existing games by Sumo wrestling bouts. 

I'm hearing several clubs have contacted Sam Allardyce about his availability today.

[Mathewbet1]

Surely all leagues in Europe have to be aligned on this or you could be faced with scenario say that one nation could void the league and another would complete the season, then you would have a mix of last years qualifiers with this years from a different league for next years european games surely a showstopper.

[Ronnie Whelan]

Rumours coming out of belgium is that club brugge will be declared champions, nobody relegated and two teams come up for next year.

 

Still think that they will try and complete the premier league given the money involved and I think it will be the same in all of the biggest leagues.

[Bellflower]

13 hours ago, Doctor Troy said:

They should send a representative from each club to fight on a revolving disc with spikes on like in Flash Gordon. I nominate Virgil Van Dijk.

Robbo. Don't bother with spikes , just let him off the lead...…...

[Harry Squatter]

23 minutes ago, Ronnie Whelan said:

Rumours coming out of belgium is that club brugge will be declared champions, nobody relegated and two teams come up for next year.

 

Still think that they will try and complete the premier league given the money involved and I think it will be the same in all of the biggest leagues.

Just seen that on Twitter. Loads of Mancs having meltdowns in the comments.

[Ronnie Whelan]

14 minutes ago, Doctor Troy said:

Just seen that on Twitter. Loads of Mancs having meltdowns in the comments.

Brugge are 15 clear there with one game from officially winning title. A lot of gent fans suddenly in the uk.

 

Think it could be relatively easy to make us champions, along with Celtic and PSG in France given the gap between 1st and 2nd.

 

The tighter leagues like Serie A, the Bundesliga and La Liga could be much harder to solve. Real issues with champions league/europa league spots and then say leeds and wba get promoted to a bigger pl at the expense of say fulham. Legal minefield that makes me think they will play out the bigger leagues.

[dockers_strike]

1 hour ago, Ronnie Whelan said:

Rumours coming out of belgium is that club brugge will be declared champions, nobody relegated and two teams come up for next year.

 

Still think that they will try and complete the premier league given the money involved and I think it will be the same in all of the biggest leagues.

Now confirmed although a working party has been set up to decide promotion, relegation and European places. Also the owner of Brescia says his club will not play any matches if Serie A re starts and they'll take the punishment.

[Guest]

2 hours ago, El Rojo said:

Lots of talk about this Duckworth Lewis. I'm all for bringing in the right young English players, but I won't be convinced until I see his xG ratings, read a few amateur blog posts and see his YouTube compilation.

Looks like you forgot to put caps lock on. Unless there are xG ratings.

[andyj]

2 hours ago, Ronnie Whelan said:

Rumours coming out of belgium is that club brugge will be declared champions, nobody relegated and two teams come up for next year.

 

Still think that they will try and complete the premier league given the money involved and I think it will be the same in all of the biggest leagues.

i think thats only sensible way to do it if the league cant be finished 

[sir roger]

1 hour ago, dockers_strike said:

Now confirmed although a working party has been set up to decide promotion, relegation and European places. Also the owner of Brescia says his club will not play any matches if Serie A re starts and they'll take the punishment.

That would be the Brescia who are 9 points from safety and whose only real hope of salvation is the league being voided ?. I am probably being cynical and he is only doing it through humanitarian concerns.

[Bjornebye]

No point having a conversation with fans who don't want us to win the league about it. 

 

Season should just re-start when its safe to do so - "No it should be voided and forgotten about, people are dying its selfish to want that"

 

Oh ok so just save the season as it is, Liverpool who are 25 points clear are champions, relegated sides down etc - "No it should be voided and started again because its not fair , no-one knows if those sides would have gone down"

 

Ok so re-start it when its safe and lets find out - "People are dying"

 

Show me where voiding it and starting it again when its safe over re-starting it when its safe saves lives? - "aaarrrggghhhh you selfish fucking cunts arrraaaa rrraaarrrggghhh" 

[Ronnie Whelan]

1 hour ago, dockers_strike said:

Now confirmed although a working party has been set up to decide promotion, relegation and European places. Also the owner of Brescia says his club will not play any matches if Serie A re starts and they'll take the punishment.

Think given the finances involved in the bigger leagues, they might be less likely to go down this route for the time being, but it would seem a really sensible solution to a problem that may not go away for a long time. A positive precedent set in Belgium for us, though ideally I would like to complete the season.

[Ronnie Whelan]

22 minutes ago, andyj said:

i think thats only sensible way to do it if the league cant be finished 

Yeah definitely. I'd say the pl are watching this space with interest.

[dockers_strike]

13 minutes ago, sir roger said:

That would be the Brescia who are 9 points from safety and whose only real hope of salvation is the league being voided ?. I am probably being cynical and he is only doing it through humanitarian concerns.

He's saying they'll forfeit the points whether it re starts or not. Just relaying what's he's said. He has been banging the drum about not re starting Serie A and I think from owners perspective, he's currently the only one.

3 minutes ago, Bjornebye said:

No point having a conversation with fans who don't want us to win the league about it. 

 

Season should just re-start when its safe to do so - "No it should be voided and forgotten about, people are dying its selfish to want that"

 

Oh ok so just save the season as it is, Liverpool who are 25 points clear are champions, relegated sides down etc - "No it should be voided and started again because its not fair , no-one knows if those sides would have gone down"

 

Ok so re-start it when its safe and lets find out - "People are dying"

 

Show me where voiding it and starting it again when its safe over re-starting it when its safe saves lives? - "aaarrrggghhhh you selfish fucking cunts arrraaaa rrraaarrrggghhh" 

I agree. Im generally pretty positive about these type of things although recent events have seen my state swing more than a pendulum.

 

I always said I believed the PL would finish so long as the major European leagues also commit to finishing. The Belgian league isnt a 'major' league in the scheme of things but to be honest, Im shocked they've gone this route so early.

 

If this gets a head of steam in say, Holland, Scotland and maybe Portugal, all relatively non major leagues, events could swiftly move. What is kind of ok in Belgium's decision is they havent voided the season, they've just ended it and declared a champion.

2 minutes ago, Ronnie Whelan said:

Think given the finances involved in the bigger leagues, they might be less likely to go down this route for the time being, but it would seem a really sensible solution to a problem that may not go away for a long time. A positive precedent set in Belgium for us, though ideally I would like to complete the season.

Yes, agree.

[Ronnie Whelan]

4 minutes ago, dockers_strike said:

He's saying they'll forfeit the points whether it re starts or not. Just relaying what's he's said. He has been banging the drum about not re starting Serie A and I think from owners perspective, he's currently the only one.

I agree. Im generally pretty positive about these type of things although recent events have seen my state swing more than a pendulum.

 

I always said I believed the PL would finish so long as the major European leagues also commit to finishing. The Belgian league isnt a 'major' league in the scheme of things but to be honest, Im shocked they've gone this route so early.

 

If this gets a head of steam in say, Holland, Scotland and maybe Portugal, all relatively non major leagues, events could swiftly move. What is kind of ok in Belgium's decision is they havent voided the season, they've just ended it and declared a champion.

Yes, agree.

Think there seems to be an opening there for them with one game left before their playoffs. I guess with Brugge, it's obvious that they were going to be champions. (Just like us, Celtic and PSG)

I think if we have a few more weeks of escalating deaths and misery which is inevitable, this decision will be the one others follow. Really tough on teams like Lazio or Monchengladbach though.

[Stickman]

Twitter has gone into a bit of a meltdown over this Belgium FA decision which is a bit baffling as I’d have thought they’d have wanted the PL to do similar as think of the lives it would save and that seemed to be the main concern with ending the league .

I’m sure Rio will push for this to happen over here as well

[Trumo]

The thing about the Belgian top division is that it's a regular round robin competition for about two-thirds of the season or something, then gets split into top and bottom halfs, where they have play-offs. What happens is that all the teams carry over 50% of their points total accumulated over the regular season, and the play off system determines the champions, the European spots and the relegation spots. So it isn't necessarily the top side in the regular season that wins the whole thing. The thing is, the regular season was only a game away from completion, and the vast majority of the placings were set in stone anyway so play off places were pretty much already decided, and Bruges were miles clear at the top (Mig gets a winners medal!), so to declare the season complete at this point doesn't affect a whole lot.

 

It's trickier to do the same thing in countries where the league is a round robin format all the way through, even if certain teams are miles clear at the top or miles adrift at the bottom.

 

Nulling and voiding should be written into league statutes so that a solution is set in stone for any future event where a season gets curtailed. However, it should only apply if, say, less than two-thirds of the season has been completed. There should be something to state that the season should resume after a certain period of time, and only call a halt if that isn't possible.

 

There is no ideal situation, because we are living through circumstances that have not been encountered before. There is now, however, an opportunity to put contingencies in place.