Should games still be postponed?

Should games still be postponed?

By Jonny Bray 
This weekend, there was uproar when the North London derby between Arsenal and Tottenham was postponed.
The Premier League said the postponement was due to a combination of COVID-19, existing and recent injuries and players being on international duty at the Africa Cup of Nations.
But that hasn't stopped fans, pundits and Tottenham from expressing their outrage at the decision.
Spurs have said they're baffled by the inconsistencies between this decision and the Premier League's choice not to postpone their game against Leicester City.
That decision ultimately led to them being eliminated from the Europea Conference League, so you can see why they're so angry, even if it's hard to ever feel any sympathy for Spurs...
They went on to say that clubs were no longer applying these rules specifically to Covid and that they do not believe it was the intent to deal with player availability unrelated to COVID-19.
Arsenal certainly aren't the only culprits of this, and there are questions to be asked around how fair it is to force some teams to play games with a large majority of their squad away for one reason or the other.

Was it the right decision?

Arsenal have nine players out due to injury, Covid-19 or involvement in the Africa Cup of Nations.
There have been several examples of other sides not having postponement requests accepted despite having more players missing.
However, this isn't the first time a side has stretched the rules like this.
Jurgen Klopp was widely criticised after saying a Covid outbreak that led to the postponement of Liverpool's Carabao Cup semi-final first leg at Arsenal had "a lot of false positives".
On top of that, there are already people saying the integrity of the league should come under scrutiny due to the number of postponed matches and missing players.
That isn't just Arsenal's fault, with several clubs making numerous requests to postpone matches during the festive period.
So, in short, this was probably a poor decision, but the Premier League has been making poor choices around game postponements all season.
It's not like this is a singular instance of inconsistent application of the rules.
Baffling decisions have been made like this all season, and it isn't Arsenal's fault that the request was accepted.
You could perhaps criticise Arsenal for putting the request in the first place.
But numerous sides have done the exact same thing since the rules first came into place.

What should happen going forward?

It's time to stop postponing games due to anything other than Covid-19 scares.
It's unfair on fans and players, both of whom are now experiencing a confusing and clustered footballing calendar in January as a result.
As Gary Neville said, it should be an option saved for the most exceptional circumstances.
The only confusing thing is how no-one saw this coming.
Surely someone must have predicted that if postponing games were made this easy that clubs would inevitably take advantage of that?The hope is that the footballing calendar can get back to normal as soon as possible, but with Burnley having not even reached the halfway point in their season yet, you've got to wonder if the damage has already been done.
Photo Credit: Getty Images

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