Football cannot have tougher standards than rest of society
It is looking likely that, as early as next week, we could enter Phase 2 of the Scottish Government’s plan for easing us out of lockdown. This would include the return of professional sport. However, as it stands, this will not include football below the Premiership level in Scotland.
The football authorities and the Scottish Government have agreed a set of rules and protocols that must be put in place before football training can resume, and the conditions are so onerous that only the Premiership clubs are currently able to implement them.
But are we in danger of football becoming more Covidregulated than any other part of Scottish life? I’ve said in the past that football should only return when it is absolutely safe to do so. That is nonnegotiable.
However, football should not be held to a higher set of standards than anyone else.
Phase 2 of the Government’s plan establishes the return of professional sport. How many other sports that plan to return will be doing so under the regime that Scottish football will need to put in place?
How many other parts of society will be operating under the same testing regimes as football? In England, some kids are already back in school. Non-essential shops and businesses are being allowed to open. Building sites are back. Even zoos and safari parks are opening back up. But Scottish football clubs? Only with conditions exceptional to them.
The testing regime that is being adopted for Scottish football is essentially the same regime that has been implemented in the English Premier League. That regime is effectively the same that was put in place in Germany in order to get the Bundesliga back in action.
That testing regime was signed off by clubs in the Bundesliga on 23 April. The world was in a different place. The R rate of infection has reduced in the seven weeks that have followed. So has our understanding of the virus. There is an argument that such an onerous testing plan was put in place to argue for the return of football BEFORE other parts of society were anywhere near ready. They were going against the science.
In Scotland, football is returning in lock step with the rest of society and in line with the Scottish Government’s phased road map that is wholly guided by science and health professionals.
Should Scottish football be holding itself to seven-weekold standards, and adopting a testing regime that is out of balance with everyone else?
As it stands, football players will be submitting themselves to twice-weekly swab testing. They are to be tested, and then await the results before they can join teammates on the training field.
No other part of Scottish society is tested to these standards. It seems absurd for example, that frontline NHS workers are not regularly tested, even once a month, whilst football players will be tested twice a week.
Davie Irons, the manager at Stenhousemuir is a police officer when away from football. He has continued to work right throughout the pandemic. He has never been tested. Prison officers handcuffed to inmates – never tested. Care home workers, in one of the most badly affected environments for the virus – not regularly tested.
Scottish football is adopting a testing regime way in excess of anywhere else.
The cost of testing is the main obstacle to football in the Scottish Championship, Leagues 1 and 2 returning. Clubs at all levels can put temperature testing in place, quickly and cheaply.
Many of the other protocols, (a number of which are also in excess to those in other workplaces) will help minimise the potential transfer of the virus.
Players are to arrive in their kit to avoid the need to enter the dressing room. After training, they go home to shower, again to avoid the need to use dressing rooms. They are to bring multiple changes of kit to limit the potential of the virus being on clothes worn for longer periods of time.
All training gear including corner flags, training bibs, footballs, cones etc are to be regularly cleaned and disinfected. All of this is easily achievable.
I’m not for a minute suggesting we take any chances. But we do need to pause for a minute and make sure that we aren’t adopting overly onerous, out of date practices and simply following the herd in our haste to get the game back.
Dave Cormack, the chairman of Aberdeen tells it like it is. He is as open and honest with supporters as you can get. He revealed that testing between now and the end of the year could cost around £100,000. That’s a lot of money by any standards. Now multiply that across the 12 Premiership clubs.
Then add in clubs below the top division when they start back up. We need to evaluate whether that level of spend is necessary.
Player safety is paramount, and I’m not suggesting we take any risks. We simply need to ensure that we are not working to unnecessarily high standards that are out of step and excessive compared to the rest of society.
As for the testing machines and swabs that clubs have bought? Maybe these could be donated to the front line, such as the NHS or to care homes where the need for regular testing is obvious.
“Football players will be submitting themselves to twice-weekly swab testing.thenawaitthe resultsbeforetheycan jointeam-matesonthe training field”
Iain Mcmenemy is the chairman of League 2 club Stenhousemuir.