Dempster: Finishing Premiership season will test new term’s options

LEEANN DEMPSTER believes finishing the current top-flight season would be invaluable in ironing out logistics for a 2020/21 kicking off behind closed doors.

The Hibernian chief executive recently called for patience in determining the future of the Ladbrokes Premiership campaign, promoting an ‘open-minded’ approach to playing the remaining games.

Dempster acknowledged that whenever domestic football does return, it will be staged in empty stadiums.

Player testing, broadcasting operations and social distancing measures for matchday employees are all part of specific criteria required to be sorted out in the event of a government go-ahead.

Those stipulations could well be needed until at least the end of the year if sport is permitted to start up again.

With that in mind, Dempster suggested that rounding off the Premiership action whenever it is safe to do so would provide opportunity to fine-tune the organisational challenges for a new campaign.

Speaking on BBC Scotland’s Off The Ball,

Dempster said: ‘If we are not going to have supporters in the stadiums, maybe it is an opportunity for us to complete the league.

‘Not because I am desperate for us to complete the league. But it would be an opportunity to test a few of the things so that, if we do come back, we have had the chance to test the stadium and test the processes and everything associated with it.

‘I don’t know if it is certain we can finish the league but we should explore the options.’