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Agencies

After 100 days and 100 nights, we are set for Premier League football on TV, and only on TV (with fake crowd noises, if you want), as the league joins many other European leagues in restarting play. There are two matches scheduled for today, to bring everyone up to 29 games played, with a full round of fixtures (including Aston Villa vs. Chelsea), Match day 30 to follow this weekend.

So what’s changed? It certainly feels everything’s a little different now, starting with the world around us (both in healthcare terms and societal terms), but also just in terms of no fans being allowed in the stadiums. The fan experience and the atmosphere is often an oversold component of the Premier League “product” and “brand”, but it is undoubtedly a significant portion of it, and not just for match-going fans. But, if the Bundesliga are able to handle “ghost games”, surely the Premier League can as well.

Strictly speaking, the football will still be the same football, though probably without much if any home field advantage. The lack of immediate fan response in the stadium could also create different situations and different paradigms for players, and it’ll be interesting to see how motivations and pressures play out for certain individuals — some might respond better, some worse!