End game at last for league but Irish Cup will go ahead

DANSKE Bank Premiership clubs will meet again today for further talks but hopes of playing out the 2019-20 league season in front of fans are over.

Uefa confirmed yesterday that Champions League and Europa League qualifiers will go ahead in August, killing off the possibility of the Irish FA extending the season here. IFA chiefs still hope to finish the Irish Cup and three clubs must be nominated to play in Europe by August 3.

Clubs will discuss the latest developments in a Premiership Management Committee meeting tonight but they have no appetite to play matches behind closed doors, so the campaign looks over.

The proposals to finish the season on the pitch by playing two more rounds of fixtures, meaning teams would have faced each other three times, or for an independent panel to choose a mathematical formula that would determine final league standings were rejected by clubs.

Premiership sides wanted to play the final seven rounds of league fixtures when fans are allowed back into stadiums but that is now impossible.

The Champions League’s fourteam preliminary round, featuring the Irish League’s top European nominee, will be played as semi-finals and a final on August 8 and 11. A venue has yet to be confirmed but Linfield have applied for it to be at Windsor Park. Our two Europa League representatives’ first games are on August 20. All matches are one-leg shoot-outs.

Irish FA president David Martin (left) said: “The transfer window needs to open for the clubs playing in Europe so they can register players and the season will need to be finished for that to happen.

“The Challenge Cup Committee is still committed to finishing the Irish Cup and the games will be played at the National Stadium.”