The Mail on Sunday

Crowds of 10,000 next?

- By Rob Draper

PREMIER LEAGUE clubs could have 10,000 fans back next month if coronaviru­s cases continue to fall.

On the day that Premier clubs saw the first fans admitted to games for almost 10 months with 2,000 fans allowed in at West Ham and Chelsea (both in London’s Tier 2), the league are working on plans to get permission for a test event as early as January to see significan­t numbers of fans at a game. Test events for larger crowds, sanctioned by STIG and the Sports Ground Safety Authority, could exceed the current limits of 2,000 in Tier 2 stadia and 4,000 in Tier 1.

The idea is to run selected events to study whether larger crowds could be accommodat­ed. It is bound to exacerbate complaints already made by the likes of Newcastle boss Steve Bruce and Marcelo Bielsa, of Leeds, that an unfair advantage will be given to the teams selected for the trials, especially as 10,000-plus supporters would be a significan­t crowd.

But without test events, no clubs will be able to have any fans back, so any accrued advantage will be seen as a necessary evil in the bid to get fans back to all clubs in significan­t numbers by the spring.

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