Tuesday, November 23, 2021
Time of the full stages over
Is the complete “football lockdown” coming now?
The time of full stadiums in Germany is over for the time being. The tightened corona measures are bringing new ghost games in Saxony and significant capacity restrictions in other federal states. Now the president of the second division Aue is calling for a “football lockdown” by the end of December.
Because of the rapidly increasing number of infections and the tightened corona measures, President Helge Leonhardt is calling for the second division soccer club Erzgebirge Aue to interrupt the season in professional football. “We need a football lockdown by the end of December. The next four weeks will be extremely difficult for our country and will be an acid test,” said Leonhardt of “Bild”.
“In such a tense situation football should live up to its role as a role model and stop the game immediately for reasons of reason, solidarity and role model effect,” he demanded: “That would be my wish and my request to the DFL and the prime ministers of the federal states.” The number of infections is particularly high in the Erzgebirgskreis in Saxony. Leonhardt sees a distortion of competition because in Saxony no spectators will be admitted to professional sport in the next few weeks. In Bavaria, a maximum of 25 percent of the stadium capacity can be used. VfB Stuttgart is also affected by a new corona regulation. At the home game against FSV Mainz on Friday, only a maximum of 25,000 spectators are allowed into the stadium under 2G-plus conditions.
“On the other hand, the stadiums in other regions are partially sold out. This is no longer fair competition and also creates new economic difficulties for the clubs that have to play in front of empty stands,” said the Aue boss. His suggestion is: “The ball will be idle until the end of December, but you can still train under the 3G rule. From January, the game should be continued, the games will then be made up in several English weeks. But not in front of empty stands, but uniformly again with fans. The fans are part of football. ”
“There is no clear political concept”
Hopes of getting through the winter without further restrictions are limited in football, as is trust in politics. Eintracht Frankfurt’s board member Axel Hellmann expects new restrictions for viewers in Hesse in the corona pandemic. “We drive on sight. You won’t get through the winter with 3G. I think that this is going in the direction of 2G and 2G +,” said the 50-year-old in an interview on the radio program “Heimspiel” on Monday evening. “I am not very optimistic. There is no clear political concept.”
For the Europa League participants, up to 40,000 spectators are admitted to the upcoming home games against Royal Antwerp on Thursday and against Union Berlin on Sunday. A maximum of ten percent of the visitors have access on the basis of a negative PCR test, the rest of the so-called 3G-plus concept must have been vaccinated or recovered.
Because of the increasing corona numbers, the VfL Wolfsburg stadium can only be used to 50 percent at home games. The new corona regulation of the state government of Lower Saxony comes into force on Wednesday and therefore also affects the top Bundesliga game on Saturday against Borussia Dortmund (3.30 p.m. / Sky). Since more than 15,000 tickets have already been sold for the game, which are now only allowed, all tickets sold in advance have been canceled.
Most recently, the Saxon Bundesliga club RasenBallsport Leipzig strongly criticized the new restrictions in Saxony. Although they accept the legal situation and understand “that everything must now be done to stop the further increase in corona infections”, they have no understanding “that the Saxon government allowed this situation to occur at all “. The club, which is affiliated with the Austrian marketing group Red Bull, announced this in a statement at the weekend.