Chelsea: Football should take the initiative to lead the return on their terms

The English Football League and two Premier League clubs – but not Chelsea, at least not publicly – are making tentative plans to return to training in mid-May. The clubs must get on the front foot to drive a return to play.

Leicester City and Norwich City have instructed their players to be ready for a mid-May return to training, and have instructed their staff to prepare the necessary measures to allow the players back in the training ground while still adhering to some level of contagion protocols. The English Football League is laying out a similar timetable for training, but on Thursday spoke much more openly about completing the 2019/20 season. The EFL estimates they can finish the season in 56 days starting in mid-June. That would entail a game every four days until mid-August – at which point they would presumably roll right into the 2020/21 season.

Meanwhile, the Bundesliga is planning to have players return to training a bit sooner, and will finish the season – rather than restart the season – in June. This would allow the players a break before the 2020/21 season akin to what they would have had they been on international duty this summer.

English clubs are being far too reactive, dare I say sheepish. Jose Mourinho continues to set the tone for how the game – and perhaps the sports industry worldwide – should be approaching this situation.

After being called to account for training with two of his Tottenham players at a public park in London, the former Chelsea manager issued a politically precise statement that contained not a shred of regret or remorse. You g-ddamned right he ordered the Code Red.

As we wrote here earlier in the week, the teams know and have a greater vested interest in their players’ health than anyone.

The coaches and medical staff every day make detailed, rigorous and nerve-wracking decisions regarding their players health. It’s their job to weigh multimillion pound, career-hanging-in-the-balance risks based on the specialized expertise and knowledge that only they have.

They need to assert their right to do their job.

The players – like everyone else in England – have been restricted in their interactions, which means the chances of them having contracting COVID-19 are infinitesimal. Premier League training grounds already have high levels of access control, and if the clubs minimize the staff to only those absolutely necessary for conducting training – sorry, lads, you’ll have to lace your own boots and do your own laundry – then the training sessions will be almost laboratory-grade clean.

The Bundesliga plans to finish the 2019/20 season with all games behind closed doors. This will be a massive revenue hit, but at least they will receive some revenue from broadcasting those games. They are choosing to accept this known, painful loss instead of risking a near total loss – the potential nullification of the season if the lockdown lasts into the summer – by outsourcing their decisions.

Chelsea, the rest of the Premier League and the English Football League may not finish their season. Whether Liverpool wins the title and teams go up or down will have less of an impact than the financial hit – perhaps collapse – attendant to an inchoate season.

The clubs do not need to be this passive. They have the political, social and financial power to determine how and where they will fight for their own survival, let alone some semblance of independence.

Maybe Roman Abramovich calls Dana White and they go halfsies on an archipelago: Fight Island to the east, Football Island to the west. Perhaps Marina Granovskaia assembles the other chief executives – first on Zoom, then in person (angels and ministers of grace defend us!) – and they build the legal, financial, political and public relations framework to lead first their teams back to training, and then the rest of the world out from hiding. Or maybe the players take the approach of “we can do more for our community by being Out There than In Here, and oh by the way, if you’ve ever gone into a one-on-one with Sergio Ramos or Diego Costa you no longer feel fear and the media already drags us through the mud for S&G… Bring it.”

All we’ve heard about the last few years (at least on this side of the pond) is about how sports are about “more than sports” and should take a leading role in this, that or the other issue. Well, here’s a chance for football to lead.

For many clubs and leagues further down the pyramid, their survival may depend on not waiting for permission to survive.