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Clubs fear coronavirus testing poses big problem to restart soccer
Top clubs are concerned that coronavirus testing is the biggest obstacle to the return of professional football, Dan Kilpatrick writes.
The Premier League will present the 20 clubs with details of ‘Project Restart’, a plan to resume the top flight in mid-June, at the shareholders meeting on Friday, while the EFL is also working on proposals for the return of the competition. .
Several Premier League clubs are expected to raise concerns that the sheer amount of testing required and the ethics of using it for footballers is potentially a major issue, while some Championship teams have similar concerns.
The “project restart” includes plans to test all Premier League players twice a week, with kits of private origin, so as not to divert supplies from vulnerable and key workers.
Squads could isolate themselves at the camps when competition resumes, and evaluating all personnel and personnel prior to each match would amount to at least 200 tests per game and up to 2,000 per game round. The Premier League, instead of the clubs, plans to manage all the tests centrally.
While spending isn’t seen as problematic, clubs believe the measures potentially look bad, particularly if evidence from the general population continues to be insufficient.
The government has repeatedly said it wants to reach its goal of 100,000 daily tests by today, but the test capacity reached 74,000 on Wednesday, and the actual number was even lower. There were also reports of kit tests running low in some areas.
The government is hopeful that the return of the Premier League will provide a positive moral boost for the country and be instrumental in driving the economic recovery, but it is reluctant to force the clubs to restart.
However, there is hope within Whitehall that the necessary evidence is not as insurmountable as some clubs feared.
There is a belief that the Premier League and EFL clubs are already leading the way in terms of hygiene and isolation of sick players, whatever the illness, but medical chiefs have emphasized that testing should be regular and not, as an source expressed it. , “Just a test and you’re ready to go.”
And there is also concern that if the Premier League doesn’t resume, money from streaming deals won’t accumulate in lower-league clubs, which are struggling to stay afloat.
Cricket is seen within government as one of the sports that can make an early return, while horse racing bosses have been prominent in driving a return as soon as possible.
