Football fans have had a number of weeks to rejoice as European football had got underway after almost three months of cancellations due to the coronavirus – the Bundesliga in Germany paved the way for others to follow after a successful restart despite a number of players testing positive for the coronavirus, but it hasn’t been good news for all as two of the popular European leagues were drawn to a close prematurely.
The cancellation of Ligue 1 in France has caused some controversy which had caused Lyon to threaten legal action – Lille owner Gerard Lopez has since stated that all Ligue 1 clubs now agree that perhaps the league was ended far too prematurely and had made French football look like pariahs as the other big leagues within Europe in the UK, Italy, and Spain are all set to get going again.
But Ligue 1 wasn’t the only big European league to get cancelled as the same was true in Scotland as the SPFL was cut short – perhaps not as big an issue as some others as the frontrunners had such a big lead, but there are fears that it could spell trouble for transfers during the summer – although it has also been stated that this could affect the younger players less than the older players.
As mentioned earlier the Bundesliga is already very much underway – the next big league within Europe to start once again will be within the Spanish La Liga as the first games since the lockdown began are set to take place on June 11th – there had been a time that Spanish football was expected to get underway first as testing had been announced in May. Following that is the much anticipated Premier League within the UK which has been confirmed to have a start date for June 17th with a push to see the season completed before August so that preparations for the 20/21 season can get underway. Finally is the Serie A in Italy with two tentative dates of June 17th for the Coppa Italia final, and the weekend of June 20-21 for other games to be played.
This is also great news for betting fans around the world as fixtures are now starting to be announced, with these fixtures being announced odds can start being drawn up and these betting sites aren’t blocked by any restrictive measure and will allow fans to start placing bets as soon as fixtures are available again – given the downtime due to the lockdown it is expected that especially early on some of these games will receive a huge amount of attention from betting fans as the same has been seen in other sports.
The next chance for French fans to see a team play will be in August if the Champions’ League does get underway – there is also concern here however as the other teams within the Champions league will have had the opportunity to play throughout the end of their respective season whilst the French teams remain inactive.
