Vital role in league meeting for City
TODAY’S meeting between the Premier League and its clubs that aims to get the season back up and running is not expected to be pretty.
There was reasonable hope a fortnight ago by those looking to restart that clubs could be training again by the middle of May, with games picking up again at some point in the first two weeks of June.
That could yet happen, but looks a lot less likely than it did.
The government have applied the brakes to their plan for lifting restrictions around the country, while there has been a failure to reach a consensus of how to finish the season among the 20 clubs. Bosses at three of the teams currently in the bottom six of the league have gone on record to voice their opposition to plans such as neutral grounds, and the suggestion that relegation and other issues would be decided in an unsporting way is hard to dispute.
But in addition to the hefty financial consequences of not finishing the season, deciding places and divisions for next season based on an incomplete campaign is hardly good either.
As Crystal Palace chairman Steve Parish told the Andrew Marr show yesterday morning: “The whole thing is sub-optimal, the moment the season stopped the competitive integrity was breached, we will be going back to something that looks like our least worst option of playing but all of those things if we can get the game on for me are far better than discussing points per game or any of the things that we may have to do to decide the end of the season.”
Palace belong to the same handful of clubs that City can be placed in – teams whose future is unlikely to be massively different whether the season is completed or not.
The South London club sit 11th in the table, six points off a European spot and 12 points clear of the relegation places.
Everton, Newcastle and Southampton directly below them are probably also unlikely to trouble either end of the table.
City are arguably the only club in the top half with nothing riding on their league campaign. They will cede their title to Liverpool but are all but
guaranteed to finish second, and finishing among the first four places may not be relevant anyway if they cannot overturn their Champions League ban.
Liverpool are waiting to be crowned champions, while every other side around the Blues is either trying to hang on to or claim a European place.
There is the Champions League and the FA Cup for them to consider, but with both of those pencilled in for later months, the Premier League is the priority for everyone else.
With valid concerns from players, fans, and chief executives about getting back underway, City’s thoughts on the matter will be very interesting to hear and should be listened to given they have seemingly less motivation for resuming or otherwise than nearly every other club in the division.