Friday, 13 March 2020

In the UK football was always going to be the tipping point for Coronavirus risk mitigation


Yesterday the PM announced the importance of not cancelling major sporting events; and the Premier League announced there would certainly be no cancellations of this weekend's matches. But anybody with any football knowledge knew that - whatever the Government's risk mitigation plans were for Coronovirus - they would become irrelevant if a single high profile Premiership player or manager became infected. 
As soon as it was confirmed that Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta had the virus last night, it was inevitable that a total shutdown of all professional football would start and that is precisely what has happened. Again, anybody with any UK football knowledge knows that this is also a game-changer as far as the whole UK economy is concerned. Millions who were previously unmoved to make any changes will voluntarily go into lock-down after panic buying (see the above immediate response). 
Note that nothing much changed when it was announced that the Government's own Health Minister got the virus a few days ago. But one key football person getting it was the single trigger for mass change.

I can only assume that the Government risk experts/advisors did not include a single person with football knowledge.....

p.s. from a purely selfish perspective, as a Spurs fan, I am delighted that - by the time the Premiership resumes - we might have some of these players fit again..


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