As a new Covid variant spreads across the UK, another football match has been called off with BBC Football tweeting confirmation of the Leicester City versus Tottenham Hotspur postponement. The news has broken following Brentford manager Thomas Frank stating that all Premier League ties this weekend should be called off to allow teams to break the chain of infections.
Leicester Versus Tottenham Hotspur Postponement as Covid Cases Rise
Previous Rejection Overturned
Brendan Rodgers had stated his disappointment on Wednesday, December 15 that his sides’ game against Tottenham would not be called off despite Leicester missing nine first-team players. However, that ruling has now been overturned with the game being called off before 12:30pm on December 16 following further positive cases at the East Midlands side.
Third Consecutive Game Postponed Involving Spurs
Following postponements to the Europa Conference League ties against Rennes and Premier League tie against Brighton and Hove Albion, this is now the third consecutive game that has been called off due to Covid involving the North London club. This third game adds to Spurs’ already called off game against Burnley that was postponed due to bad weather and means they face a heavy backlog of games to be cleared up once the cases of Covid sweeping through sports and the world are brought back under control.
Game Backlog Could Prove Tough to Sort
With the 2022 World Cup in Qatar set to take place in the British winter, the postponements in the Premier League may prove hard to reschedule with timescales already tight to fit everything in before this latest wave of the pandemic took hold.
The main thing right now is the players’ safety and health as well as their families and the public as the booster vaccination programme is sped up to try and ensure that life can continue as normally as possible in the coming months, but this won’t be the last of the games to fall foul of Covid and the backlog will need to be managed sensibly to protect players health.
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