Scotland’s first minister and interim chief medical officer have appeared to rule out the resumption of football matches behind closed doors, a move which will increase anxiety at the country’s professional clubs.
The vast majority of the Scottish Professional Football League’s sides – including Celtic and Rangers – have used the government’s job retention scheme or implemented pay cuts or deferrals for players and staff. The 2019-20 campaign for the lower three tiers has already been abandoned and the Premiership is heading for the same outcome upon receipt of Uefa approval.
The SPFL has been anxious to be in position to start its new season on the first weekend in August as per details of a new broadcasting deal with Sky Sports, worth a record £160m, and season tickets for the 2020-21 season are already widely on sale. The Scottish Football Association even hopes to open a new campaign with its cup semi-finals, which would ordinarily attract an aggregate of at least 80,000 spectators.
Both options are now seriously remote, with Nicola Sturgeon also suggesting matches with no spectators would not be viable unless there is a major coronavirus breakthrough. “In terms of playing behind closed doors, clearly there are issues there in terms of, does that completely take away the risk of big events?” the first minister said.
“If a match is being played behind closed doors but it’s still on TV the danger then is people still congregate together in groups to watch that so these things often have to be very carefully considered.”
Gregor Smith, Scotland’s interim CMO, said: “I just want to emphasise that point that just the very act of playing behind closed doors doesn’t mean to say we won’t get gatherings of people trying to enjoy sport together.”
On the general theme of football’s return, Sturgeon was similarly circumspect. “I would absolutely say that people should not be under the expectation that large-scale mass gatherings will be starting any time soon. We want to get a semblance of normality back into people’s lives for all sorts of reasons as quickly as possible, but we cannot do that in a way that risks a resurgence of this virus and then all of the things we’ve tried to avoid becoming what happens again.
“I know that is not good news for people, which is the majority of our population, who have sport as a really important part of their lives and our culture and how we use our leisure time but it would be wrong for me to give false expectations right now about an early resumption of football matches or rugby matches or large-scale sporting events like that.”
