General Premier League Thread 2022-23 - mod note in OP 12/03/23

Yes. And it should be clear to anyone who knows anything about that city, why they choose to do so.

Well it seems the backlash will come from not playing.

Fans want the games played and should come before pearl clutching auld ones and twitter moaners.

It's a function of modern PR and the power of the twitteratti - the EPL didn't want to get left behind in the virtue signalling around the death, and probably misread the room slightly, or at the very least erred on the side of caution.

A really poor decision though, really calls into question the judgement of the people running the league.

Seemingly 'Bruno' is a real person and is in fact a Brighton legend

Although it looks like he's going to Chelsea with Potter so I wouldn't be backing him too heavily for the Brighton job...

That's a large part of why I think the matches were cancelled. And they'd be even more vocal north of the English border.

It's a nonsense to call the matches off. And next weekend too, in a season that's already congested enough. Throw another COVID overreaction this Winter in there as well and it could be a right mess at the end.

The games were called off because fans were not trusted to respect the minutes silence and it would have reflected badly when being shown on TV abroad. Police resources were another reason.

The minutes silence at Tynecastle the other day was appalling (yes, I am aware it is Scotland), West Ham had to go for a minutes applause instead of silence.

The reason there is no football this weekend is because of football fans. Nobody else.

If they’re worried about a minutes silence, not going well, they could just not have one?

Generally a minutes silence, is a lovely display of respect given, rather than a respect forced.

But ok, football fans are to blame for hypothetically (and without any evidence that it would even actually happen) not sharing the same sentiments that they’re being told to. Lots of people die without a minutes silence being held across the country and that’s fine.

No I agree like. But this is the problem. Not football fans not feeling/respecting the people that they’re told to. Some day in this country also, people who are unpopular with large sections of the working classes (Varadkar and Bertie Ahern probably the first examples that come to my mind) are also going to die.

Surely the appropriate thing to do when this happens is to allow the people who want to grieve/respect do so, and not create forced displays that will only antagonise. If they try do tributes to John Delaney in Irish football stadiums, are you seriously going to try blame the people who react, the way we know they’re going to react?

The GAA won't like you saying that.

Anyone who attended 1 game in his/her life gets a mention during the championship.

Not sure how it's misleading - it was in direct reply to someone saying "England playing SA cricket test match today yet no football ffs, farcical." And the single rugby league play-off has also been held up as an example. Most racecards have been lost and even what's going ahead at Doncaster is reduced (2 days racing 15 races have been condensed to 9 races). The handful of county cricket matches scheduled for today were also postponed by the way.

I just think 'there's a cricket match on, why can't we have 60 football matches?' is a clearly flawed comparison. But again I emphasise that I think football made the wrong call, but the Eng v SA cricket match doesn't prove the point.