SO, Project Restart — or more accurately, Project Premier League Restart — is here.
It is a disgrace it doesn’t involve any support for the beleaguered 71 EFL clubs but I guess that’s an ugly, elitist reality.
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Like Brexit, Covid-19 divides opinion. But we are now at a stage where the world is turning again and sport can be no different.
Football really isn’t in any kind of rude health and it’s certainly no role model.
It is returning solely for money to appease TV contracts that may still need further concessions to be satisfied, such as deeper access from matches for fans stuck at home.
Fallout from this lockdown could lead to overzealous, unnecessary and scientifically unproven social distancing for years, meaning spectator sport could be gone for a long time.
That would spell the end for many clubs.
The biggest beneficiaries — the players — have already alienated themselves from their employers and fans with their resolute determination not to help their industry in any way.
There are still reservations about returning to non-contact training.
The Football League — the runt of football’s litter — is already suffering from a systemic bout of financial social distancing.
Huge disparity between Premier League and EFL revenues means the average top-flight club receives as much for 90 minutes of football in TV monies as a Championship team gets for an entire 46-game season.
The EFL has started to shut its leagues down, compounding the notion the Premier League is the only important league.
Assuming Project Restart isn’t grounded, people need to stop pontificating. Players need to embrace it.
It’s not good enough for them to be sitting on the sidelines as they’ve done with the finances — in part it’s only returning to pay their wages.
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Football is likely to be one of the safest workplaces on the planet given the measures being taken, so they need to get on with it.
Spain, one of the countries initially ravaged by Covid-19, have agreed to return in two weeks.
Players here should show some character or state publicly that they have no intention of returning until vaccines or medical science reaches the level they determine is acceptable.
Project Restart shouldn’t be just about getting games back on, it should also include returning integrity and financial probity to the sport.
Healing the wounds of divisions — created by the appalling conduct of player unions, the selfishness of the players and financial mismanagement — with a real blueprint.
It should also include a support package for 71 equally important clubs and sets of fans outside the Premier League where they are facing Armageddon.
Never mind Project Restart. It becomes so big it almost becomes Project Where Do We Start?
SIMON JORDAN’S Final Word is on talkSPORT on Sunday from 5-8pm.
Source: Soccer - thesun.co.uk
