Fans back in stadiums

[Tony Moanero]

On 20/03/2021 at 10:10, Scott_M said:

I'd give anything for supporters to be allowed back into Anfield on 14th April.

That’s just over three weeks time. Only a couple of million people in the UK have had both does of the vaccine!

[Reckoner]

As a man with no life I’ve just been watching Liverpool v Nottingham Forest FA cup semi final replay from 1989, at Old Trafford on YouTube.

Nobody needs to be told about the emotional aspect to it, although I was too young to remember it from the time.

At the end, and you should watch this, you really see the connection between the fans, the players, and, of course, the manager. Motson comments on it.

Fuck it, I just don’t think that connection exists on the same way at other clubs. As a result we have been affected by empty stadiums more than most. We’re an emotional city and therefore an emotional team.

[Barrington Womble]

9 hours ago, Reckoner said:

As a man with no life I’ve just been watching Liverpool v Nottingham Forest FA cup semi final replay from 1989, at Old Trafford on YouTube.

Nobody needs to be told about the emotional aspect to it, although I was too young to remember it from the time.

At the end, and you should watch this, you really see the connection between the fans, the players, and, of course, the manager. Motson comments on it.

Fuck it, I just don’t think that connection exists on the same way at other clubs. As a result we have been affected by empty stadiums more than most. We’re an emotional city and therefore an emotional team.

To be fair, those players had been going to funerals of the fans between Hillsborough and that day. There couldn't not be a bond with all of those individuals and the fans after that. It would have been the same at absolutely any other club had they gone through that. 

[Reckoner]

15 hours ago, Barrington Womble said:

To be fair, those players had been going to funerals of the fans between Hillsborough and that day. There couldn't not be a bond with all of those individuals and the fans after that. It would have been the same at absolutely any other club had they gone through that. 

I like to think some of that connection remains partly due to that, despite the change in personnel.

A good article in the Guardian about the lack of fans:-

Liverpool's Thiago opens up on psychological impact of empty Anfield 

• ‘We’ve had to relearn our craft,’ midfielder says
• Thiago sorry not to have seen normal Liverpool lifE

 

Liverpool’s Thiago Alcântara has emphasised the psychological difficulty of playing football in the Covid-19 era, saying the lack of supporters makes it harder to keep going in the final stages of matches.

Whereas many high-profile figures, including Liverpool’s manager, Jürgen Klopp, have decried the impact of this season’s packed schedule on players’ fitness, Thiago said the emotional impact was even greater.

Premier League's relentlessness has offered no chance to think – until now

“More than physical I think it’s psychological,” the midfielder told the Spanish newspaper AS while preparing for Spain’s World Cup qualifiers. “You lack the boost fans give you in the final moments of matches, which gives you that physical boost.

“There’s also the fact you can do very little every day around the city. You go from home to training to training at home and get into a cycle where that’s all you do.”

Thiago has yet to feel the force of a full Anfield since joining Liverpool from Bayern Munich last year and his first season on Merseyside has coincided with the team’s sudden decline, after they romped to the Premier League title last season, including the worst home run in the club’s history.

“It will be beautiful to see a full Anfield but I also want to learn what day-to-day life is like in this new country,” the 29-year-old said. “Football loses a lot of its essence without fans in the stands. We’re competing in empty stadiums and we’ve had to relearn our craft because when we were children we played in grounds without fans, with parents screaming.

“We knew how to do that but we were used to playing with fans supporting us and shouting against us. Now we’ve gotten used to playing without fans, but we miss having them in the stadiums so much; every day we long for them.”

 

[Guest Alex_K]

Thiago is very intelligent. Hallmarks of the next Guardiola about him.

[an tha]

The more i see of this the more i think i might sadly be right about never seeing (or not for a very long time) full stadiums.

 

You can't have a full house and social distancing.

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/56566256

 

Yes i understand test events, but what is to be gained from them in terms of getting back to full houses.

 

Sitting a small number of people in wembley and controlling how they get there and having mask wearing and social distancing means we learn nothing to prove anything for future normality apart from giving them insight into how it works in a really controlled way with smaller crowds, masks, distancing etc.

 

 

[Halcyon Days]

6 minutes ago, an tha said:

The more i see of this the more i think i might sadly be right about never seeing (or not for a very long time) full stadiums.

 

You can't have a full house and social distancing.

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/56566256

 

Yes i understand test events, but what is to be gained from them in terms of getting back to full houses.

 

Sitting a small number of people in wembley and controlling how they get there and having mask wearing and social distancing means we learn nothing to prove anything for future normality apart from giving them insight into how it works in a really controlled way with smaller crowds, masks, distancing etc.

 

 

Is this even after every man woman and child has been given the antidote?

[Bjornebye]

14 minutes ago, an tha said:

The more i see of this the more i think i might sadly be right about never seeing (or not for a very long time) full stadiums.

 

You can't have a full house and social distancing.

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/56566256

 

Yes i understand test events, but what is to be gained from them in terms of getting back to full houses.

 

Sitting a small number of people in wembley and controlling how they get there and having mask wearing and social distancing means we learn nothing to prove anything for future normality apart from giving them insight into how it works in a really controlled way with smaller crowds, masks, distancing etc.

 

 

The Dutch trialled 5000 fans for their match on Saturday. The stands behind the goals were packed tight but they were socially distanced around the sides. Hardly a mask in sight. I do think we will see full stadiums by the end of next season but (same goes for all re-openings) it needs to be staggered and properly managed. 

[an tha]

53 minutes ago, Halcyon Days said:

Is this even after every man woman and child has been given the antidote?

If that was the barometer then it really is never going to happen!

[LFC 6 Times]

What happened to 21st of June?

[Barrington Womble]

3 hours ago, Bjornebye said:

The Dutch trialled 5000 fans for their match on Saturday. The stands behind the goals were packed tight but they were socially distanced around the sides. Hardly a mask in sight. I do think we will see full stadiums by the end of next season but (same goes for all re-openings) it needs to be staggered and properly managed. 

I think we'll see full houses in the euros. 

[Butch]

Giving city the chance to be presented the trophy on front of their fans, no way. 

[Scott_M]

They are taking baby steps towards full re-openings. 
 

I don’t see what 4k in a 90k stadium achieves though. And why not both semi finals? 
 

With some luck, we could have a crowd on the 28th April. 
 

I also think the Euros will have more or less full houses. Or the games in Britain will, no idea about other countries. 

[Scott_M]

20 hours ago, Bjornebye said:

The Dutch trialled 5000 fans for their match on Saturday. The stands behind the goals were packed tight but they were socially distanced around the sides. Hardly a mask in sight. I do think we will see full stadiums by the end of next season but (same goes for all re-openings) it needs to be staggered and properly managed. 

Once everybody has been offered a vaccine, what else can be done? 
 

The most vulnerable have been protected as well as they can, everybody else has had an option to protect themselves and their families? 
 

The only other controls they could have is quick tests to take daily or vaccination passports - neither of which are obviously ideal. 

[Bjornebye]

1 hour ago, Scott_M said:

Once everybody has been offered a vaccine, what else can be done? 
 

The most vulnerable have been protected as well as they can, everybody else has had an option to protect themselves and their families? 
 

The only other controls they could have is quick tests to take daily or vaccination passports - neither of which are obviously ideal. 

Cramming 50k plus fans into stadiums this summer would be absolutely fucking preposterous. 

[Scott_M]

9 minutes ago, Bjornebye said:

Cramming 50k plus fans into stadiums this summer would be absolutely fucking preposterous. 

 

Even if they've all been offered a vaccination? Thats where the UK looks to be heading. Current vaccine take up is c.80% for those offered (I think, the data isn't clear).

 

I don't think there should be any away fans but UK nationals should be approaching OK.

[Bjornebye]

11 minutes ago, Scott_M said:

 

Even if they've all been offered a vaccination? Thats where the UK looks to be heading. Current vaccine take up is c.80% for those offered (I think, the data isn't clear).

 

I don't think there should be any away fans but UK nationals should be approaching OK.

I'd give it until at least the end of the year before taking unnecessary risks personally. Trust me I want everything back open as much as the next person. I'm just keen to see caution applied. 

[Tony Moanero]

2 hours ago, Scott_M said:

 

Even if they've all been offered a vaccination? Thats where the UK looks to be heading. Current vaccine take up is c.80% for those offered (I think, the data isn't clear).

 

I don't think there should be any away fans but UK nationals should be approaching OK.

Let’s not run before we can walk, eh?

 

How many people in the U.K. have been fully vaccinated? Approximately 3 million, isn’t it? 

 

Plenty of clinically extremely vulnerable people aren’t due their second dose until May!

[Scott_M]

23 minutes ago, Tony Moanero said:

Let’s not run before we can walk, eh?

 

How many people in the U.K. have been fully vaccinated? Approximately 3 million, isn’t it? 

 

Plenty of clinically extremely vulnerable people aren’t due their second dose until May!

 

The first dose is 76% effective, the 2nd dose makes it 82% effective.

 

I'm not saying we should be rushing in until everything is in place, but IMO, the first dose for those without vulnerabilities should be sufficient to get things moving again.

[Bjornebye]

31 minutes ago, Scott_M said:

 

The first dose is 76% effective, the 2nd dose makes it 82% effective.

 

I'm not saying we should be rushing in until everything is in place, but IMO, the first dose for those without vulnerabilities should be sufficient to get things moving again.

Getting things moving again and having a stadium full of 50 thousand people are different things mate. Baby steps and all that. 

[Scott_M]

9 minutes ago, Bjornebye said:

Getting things moving again and having a stadium full of 50 thousand people are different things mate. Baby steps and all that. 

 

Thats having 4k at the FA Cup semi finals and 10k in stadiums for the final 2 games of the season. 

 

I appreciate what you and Tony are saying and obviously how the next few weeks go are key. The test events I mentioned are both c.6 weeks away and the Euro's Finals are c.8-10 weeks away - putting this in context, we'd vaccinated c.9m as of 1st February, as of 30th March we've vaccinated c.30m. We've made huge strides in 2021.

 

At the rate things are going, if the numbers support it (ie vaccinations available / infections & deaths remain low), I don't see why we would wait.

 

 

[VladimirIlyich]

On 30/03/2021 at 18:04, Scott_M said:

 

Thats having 4k at the FA Cup semi finals and 10k in stadiums for the final 2 games of the season. 

 

I appreciate what you and Tony are saying and obviously how the next few weeks go are key. The test events I mentioned are both c.6 weeks away and the Euro's Finals are c.8-10 weeks away - putting this in context, we'd vaccinated c.9m as of 1st February, as of 30th March we've vaccinated c.30m. We've made huge strides in 2021.

 

At the rate things are going, if the numbers support it (ie vaccinations available / infections & deaths remain low), I don't see why we would wait.

 

 

We'd wait so as not to start yet another potential breakout. An 82% rate of effectiveness is great but it would still leave a potential,what 180 per 1000 with a chance of catching the virus. Im in the 50+ bracket and myself and my missus wont be receiving our second jab until early June. Add to the fact it can take a couple of weeks to reach full immunity after said injections and we are still a while away from full and effective coverage. 

[Code]

How is the tier thing looking now in Liverpool, compared to when we had fans back this season?

[Barrington Womble]

1 hour ago, Code said:

How is the tier thing looking now in Liverpool, compared to when we had fans back this season?

Prior to Christmas the rates in Liverpool were kicking around 80-100 cases per hundred thousand. It exploded over Xmas. As of the latest council update, we're at 33.3. 

 

I have to say I agree with @Scott_M on this one (which doesn't happen very often!). If the vaccine roll out is running as planned, I see no issue in things returning to normally domestically in the summer - although obviously travel is a different thing. Even at 80% protection, it's not like the other 20% end up with severe issues, it's almost all minor symptoms. Without wanting to sound like SD, but surely the successful deployment of the vaccine means we can start treating covid like the flu? We also have a reference point of last year where once we were outdoors, the virus barely kept going. It was only the return to schools and the indoors in the autumn when it kicked off again. I hope there are full grounds for the Euros. But it's all dependent on the successful deployment of the vaccine. 

 

I noticed someone posted what the benefit of 4k matches are. I've not seen that news story. But I would image test days will be important. If LFC are a reference for everything else, we were forced to go NFC for the phase before Xmas, something which it looks like the club are keeping, although I don't know if this is a requirement. With new ways to have people entering, plus any new processes for stewards, trial days make sense to me. 

[Code]

With the speed of vaccines getting done in the UK you should be back with some fans now I think, let people having taken the vaccine get in. 
 

I read something about flu season today, its normally from week 40 to week 20. In Norway we use to have around 500.000 every season, so far this time around the number is 13. 

 

But to sum it all up, the situation today is better than it was when fans could get in before Christmas, am I right?

 

With the good vaccination progress, why have they not let some fans back in?