[SPORT] France: Government rules out restart of Ligue 1 in June

[H O L D F I R E 流]

"The 2019-2020 professional sports season will not be able to resume": by excluding any restart before August, the French government forced football and rugby on Tuesday to accept the evidence of a historic end to their seasons. Exposing his deconfinement plan, Prime Minister Edouard Philippe whistled the end of the game for professional competitions (L1, L2, Top 14, Pro D2) suspended since mid-March because of the coronavirus. Football and rugby joined basketball, handball and volleyball, which had already marked the definitive end of their season in circumstances never before seen in French sport since the Second World War. "The major sporting events (...), all the events which gather more than 5000 participants (...) cannot be held before September", declared the Prime Minister to the deputies. The Ministry of Sports then told AFP that there could not be a competition "even behind closed doors" before the end of July, leaving open the possibility of holding certain matches in August. This could allow Lyon and Paris SG to finish their course in the Champions League in August, a hypothesis favored by UEFA, the Parisian club even considering playing its quarter-final abroad if the sanitary situation forced it . In the meantime, the horizon has suddenly been blocked for football, the king of sport in the land of world champions. The President of the French Federation (FFF) Noël Le Graët has also taken note of the government opinion by declaring to the Breton daily newspaper Le Télégramme that Ligue 1 and Ligue 2 were "definitively stopped for the 2019-2020 season", pending the final decision of the Professional Football League (LFP), which must meet its office Thursday and its general assembly in mid-May. The National 1 (3rd division) and the 1st female division, pending until then, also end. - "A disaster area" - The hypothesis favored by the Professional Football League (LFP), namely to resume Ligue 1 on June 17 in camera, and finish it on July 25, is therefore obsolete, generating immense financial uncertainty for a sector very dependent on its TV rights. For now, we will have to decide the issue of the title of champion (PSG occupied the first place before the suspension), that of European places and possible relegations. And economic stability will be put to the test: "What about club finances? Six months without revenue, how do we do it? Like tourism or air travel we are a disaster sector, it's official now," summed up the president of a Ligue 1 club with AFP, very worried. According to an estimate by the Ministry of Sports, the losses for the six major professional sports (football, rugby, cycling, handball, volleyball, basketball) amount to 1.45 billion euros in the event that the championships are not resumed. Including 1.16 billion euros for professional football alone (L1 and L2 clubs). But for Sylvain Kastendeuch, co-president of the football union UNFP, it is a "responsible" decision. "The government has understood that the economic emergency should not take precedence over the public health imperative," he reacted.