TOURS THREATEN PLAYER SAFETY
WEATHER permitting, Liverpool will play Crystal Palace in the first round of the Asia Trophy today. A monsoon forced a training session indoors on Monday and more rain is expected to take a toll on the playing surface in Hong Kong. The last time the Premier League’s pre-season tournament was played there, Andre Villas-Boas threatened to withdraw his Tottenham team after Jan Vertonghen and Matija Nastasic of Manchester City suffered injuries on a boggy pitch. This follows the chaotic circumstances in Beijing last year, when a match between Manchester United and Manchester City was cancelled with similar fears for player safety. The clubs had to make do with half-paced training sessions in one of the world’s most aggressively polluted cities instead. Jose Mourinho was so upset with the preparation, he ordered United to train at dawn on their return to Manchester. Without doubt, the climate in many of the destinations east — not to mention the travelling time — is not conducive to athletic conditioning. With the physical demands of the season increasing, club executives may soon have to decide between player welfare and the financial benefits of an Asian tour. That will be one of the year’s shorter board meetings, one imagines.