When will sport return ?

Apr 18, 2020
football betting tips -

 

Written 17/04/20 @ 08:00

 

I have done my best to try and give a round up of the current situation in most major leagues/ sports, but you will appreciate it is a fast changing environment ..............
 

 
Serie A:
 
Italy's minister for sport Vincenzo Spadafora is hoping to confirm a May 4 date for the return to Serie A training as soon as possible.Plans being discussed at present include all players being tested for the virus 96 hours beforehand and then isolated in training camps in the south of the country, with all games played there every three days in empty stadiums, ending in mid July and without any players whose contracts are set to expire on June 30th. This is very different to what we have heard elsewhere and there are some big name players with contracts ending this summer.
 
 
La Liga:
 
 
In Spain they are discussing three possible return dates (May 28,June 6, June 28) and feel that a finish to the 19-20 season by the end of August is viable.President Javier Tebas has estimated Spanish clubs would lose around one billion euros (£872million) if the season is not completed. A draft of the league's protocol, seen by Reuters, for returning to training and matches once given the green light by health authorities recommends that clubs hold training camps at their training grounds or hotels for a two-week period before matches can start again. Only first team players, coaching staff and a small number of other staff would be allowed to access the facility, with everyone at the training camp being subjected to two COVID-19 tests before accessing the site.Testing would continue to take place during the camps, added the protocol.
 
That seems a tight schedule and the earliest proposed date seems unlikely.
 
 
Bundesliga:
 
 
We have discussed the Bundesliga a lot over the last week or so and they remain the most likely major league to return to action soonest, clubs have been training for some time, shops are reopening in Germany next week and the league are meeting on the 23rd of this month to discussed the current suspension which runs until April 30th.............fingers crossed !
 
 
Ligue 1:
 
 
They are considering a June 3rd or 17th restart in France with the plan that if it is the later date, all games would be able to be completed by July 25th and playoffs by August 2nd. The two cup finals have been provisionally rescheduled for June 27th and July 11th.
 

Broadcasters beIN Sports and Canal+ have withheld payment of the latest instalment of their TV rights deal, believed to have been worth around €130m. There are fears that if the season cannot be completed it may cost French clubs up to €300m in total.The LFP is even looking into whether it can attract investment from a third-party to help support some of the clubs who are going to struggle to survive. In England the Premier League is strong and so is the Football Association and they hold large cash reserves ( EPL is said to have close to £2b in cash) but in France all of the money goes to the clubs so the LFP or French football federation does not have the money to bail them out.Last week the players’ union, the UNFP, agreed a deal with the LFP and the clubs’ union that will see the majority defer some of their wages until the season is over, each player must sign a new contract with their club to say they agree with this deferment.

 
Premier League:
 
 
The Premier League might hold plenty of cash (see above), but not all clubs will be in a position to refund payments already received under the terms of the television deal, they are meeting today to discuss the possibility of putting a June 30th deadline on the 2019-20 season. Reasons given for that date are player and sponsor contracts, but they hardly seem insurmountable given the wider issues and it seems very early when all other countries are looking beyond that time frame.
 
 
UEFA and the Champions League:
 
 

UEFA is working towards plans that would see the Champions League final end the 2019-20 season on 29 August.The idea is still to finish the season(s) as a whole at the end of August, with all outstanding games played.

That would mean the Champions League final taking place in Istanbul on 29 August, with the Europa League final in Gdansk three days earlier.

Two scenarios for getting to that situation are under consideration.The first is to play the quarter-finals and semi-finals as two-legged matches as normal in July and August.The second would be for the games to be played as one-off fixtures after the end of the domestic seasons, potentially condensing the end of the competition into a week-long mini tournament.

 
Finances:
 
 
At the end of the day, like much in sport, it all comes down to money , few clubs/leagues can afford to lose out on, or to refund television money and whether it is solely down to that or that it is the sensible thing to do, there does seem to be a real desire to complete the 2019-20 season in almost all countries. Arguments for not doing so seem pretty much selfish or rather small in the bigger scheme of things and the idea of changing rules once an event has started are just plain wrong. IMO, whenever football returns it should be to complete the current campaign, following that of the 2020-21 seasons need to be truncated then so be it, a PL season doesn't have to be 38 games, it could be 30 or even less, as long as fixtures are planned as fairly as possible and everyone knows the rules at the start, that seems far more suitable than ending a season with so few games left to play and so much effort and money (if we must !) expended.
 
 
Summer Leagues:
 
 
It is a little different in MLS (only two rounds played) , Japan (one round completed) and Brazil (yet to start) and they have more options open to them. In the US training is still banned and therefore, the proposed return date of May 10th seems pie in the sky. Early optimism of a speedy return to action in Japan (mostly from me I must admit !) now seems unlikely with new lockdown measures introduced. However, the plan is still to complete the season in Japan and J-League met earlier this week to update the format .............
 
 

1. Clubs finishing in first and second place of the J2 LEAGUE will be automatically promoted to the J1 LEAGUE and J1/J2 Play-Offs will not be held.
2. Clubs finishing in first and second place of the J3 LEAGUE will be automatically promoted to the J2 LEAGUE.
3. If either of the top two finishers do not possess a requisite license, promotion will not carry down to any clubs in third place or below.
4. The above rules apply only when each category holds more than 75% of its total matches and 50% of each team's games. However, it may be further discussed at the board of directors to meet a contingency.
5. If the above criteria are not met, the season will not be considered as completed. The ranking in each category will not be determined and there will be no promotion. Hence in the 2021 season, the number of clubs in each category will be 18-20 clubs for J1, 20-24 clubs for J2 and 14-18 clubs for J3.

Prize Money and Awards

1. If the season is not completed, prize money will not be paid and awards and presentation ceremonies will not be held.
2. If the season is not completed, scoresheets of the matches will be used as reference data. Player's stats (appearances, goals, etc.) will be counted as records.

 

Other sport:

 

The PGA Tour is planning to return in mid June at the Colonial event in Fort Worth, Texas, that and all early tournaments played will be without spectators, with dates for some events shifted and others retaining their place on the original schedule. Golf is a sport which lends itself to social distancing more than most and with two months to sort out the logistics of the event, it seems do-able.

The Tour de France has been rescheduled for August 29-September 20th, with the finish in Paris set to coincide with the start of the French Open Tennis, that sounds great on paper, but the plans for the biggest event in cycling have already been criticised and it can hardly be held without spectators and with regard to tennis, many top players are already saying that the sport cannot be played this year. But they are the "haves" of the tennis world and many players outside the top 80 , even some "names" ,are playing to survive , are on the breadline and will be far keener to return.

 

Latest reports suggest that there is a growing sense of optimism in the NBA that the 2019-20 season can be salvaged amid the coronavirus pandemic and played out in some form, albeit without fans. One owner has put forward a suggestion that players should be allowed June to get back in shape, resuming the regular season in July and playing the NBA Finals in October.

When the NBA suspended play March 11, teams had between 15-19 games remaining in the regular season, the postseason was scheduled to begin tomorrow actually, with the Finals set to start June 4.

MLB commissioner Rob Manfred vowed to the Associated Press on Wednesday that the league would "turn over every stone to try to play the game in 2020 if there’s any way we can in this environment.” Two primary suggestions under consideration are the Arizona plan, in which all games would be played at empty Arizona Spring Training stadiums, and the Arizona-Florida plan, under which games are played at teams’ respective Cactus League and Grapefruit League facilities. The Arizona-only plan represents normally structured baseball, but players hate it because they would all be quarantined from their families for four months. MLB has accepted that there will be no fans. There are some other tinkerings on the table too, as the National Newspaper Publishers Association reports the league is considering an “electronic device to call balls and strikes and, at least for the 2020 season, eliminate the home plate umpire.” There is also talk of players sitting in the stands instead of the dugout to maintain social distancing, and mic'd up players for a more interesting stay-at-home game-watching experience.

We are still three months away from when NFL training camps are supposed to start (mid July) and therefore, "football" has far more options than pretty much any other sport.

 

Good luck and stay safe !

 

 

We don't just sell football betting tips, as you can see there is an extensive analysis behind our asian handicap selections. Subscribing to our sports betting advice service need not break the bank. Learn more by visiting our subscriptions page.

Sport: 
Football
Golf
NFL
Tennis

Don't be selfish, share the betting tips

Must Read Betting Articles