On Tuesday, French Prime Minister Edouard Philippe confirmed that France’s top two tiers of football would not be able to resume the 2019-20 season. Philippe announced all major sporting events in the country will be put on hold until September.
OFFICIAL: "Big sporting events will not be able to take place before September," said French PM Edouard Philippe. "The 2019-20 season, notably for football, will not be able to resume." Ligue 1 & Ligue 2 are done.
— Jonathan Johnson (@Jon_LeGossip) April 28, 2020
As for the standings, the decisions to make for the two leagues are on which teams will be promoted/relegated and if league leader PSG will be crowned champion or not. The Netherland’s Eredivisie chose to scrap all the results and not award a title.
France’s Ligue de Football Professionnel — LFP for short — has a monumental decision to make on its leagues. It is more and more likely that other leagues will abandon their seasons, and other leagues will look to see how the LFP decides to hand out European qualification and relegation.
The LFP has been considering three options on how to sort out the final standings. The first option is to place teams according to the ratio of points per match played as not all teams have played the same number of games. The second option is to take the standings after matches of Matchday 27. Third, the standings from the halfway point of the season could be used.
Les trois options étudiées par la LFP pour déterminer le classement final de la Ligue 1. (RMC Sport) pic.twitter.com/w25PEGucOv
— Actu Foot (@ActuFoot_) April 28, 2020
PSG is champion in every scenario and the same would happen for Liverpool if the Premier League were to take the same approach.
Ligue 1’s Twitter has yet to make an announcement. The decision to not resume seems to be new to Ligue 1 as on Monday the league was still awaiting to resume play.
Waiting for Ligue 1 to resume like...#MondayMood
Ángel Di María/Instagram pic.twitter.com/eM3RjOerPz— Ligue1 English (@Ligue1_ENG) April 27, 2020
The decision has not come without criticism as LaLiga president Javier Tebas said in a statement he was confused why play wouldn’t resume behind closed doors.
“I do not understand why there would be more danger in playing football behind closed doors, with all precautionary measures, than working on an assembly line, being on a fishing boat on the high seas, etc,” he said. “If important economic sectors cannot restart, in a safe controlled manner, they could end up disappearing. That could happen to professional football. In other countries teams are already training; that’s an example to follow.
“In Spain, football is an important economic driver that we need to reactivate like many others. We continue to focus on this reactivation in a responsible manner and adhering to health recommendations, as soon as possible.”
A major factor in the decision to not resume the French leagues was Montpellier’s Junior Sambia being the first Ligue 1 player to test positive for coronavirus last week. Sambia had to be placed in an artificial coma but is now recovering and able to breathe on his own.
Montpellier's Junior Sambia is out of his coma and has been taken off a respirator. https://t.co/It30lwd8Yi pic.twitter.com/jV1Tg6Mls1
— theScore (@theScore) April 27, 2020
