BBC: Premier League winter break under discussion before new TV deal

[Paxi]

The Premier League is considering introducing a winter break when a television rights deal is next agreed.

The top leagues in Germany, France, Italy and Spain all take time out in mid-season.

The Football Association has previously said a winter break is not feasible until the end of the current television deal in 2019.

Talks have been ongoing for several months and are understood to have been constructive.

A January break has been under discussion, so if it gets agreed it would not impact on the traditional festive football schedule.

An announcement on the next Premier League TV rights is expected next week. The league is seeking an increase on the current £5.14bn deal which includes 168 live matches a season, with Sky holding five packages of games and BT two.

The prospect of a winter break is referenced in the tender documents that have been sent to broadcasters. The next TV deal will cover 2019 to 2022.

"The Premier League has been in discussions with the FA and EFL for several months regarding the challenges of the increasingly congested English football calendar and ways in which we can work together to ease fixture congestion while also giving players a mid-season break," the Premier League said in a statement.

"Provided space can be found in the calendar, we are open to this in principle and will continue constructive discussions with our football stakeholders to seek a workable solution."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/42954835

 

[Ramshock]

Sky will shit all over this idea like they have always done.

 

[mav_9me]

Wouldnt taking out the league cup create enough dates for a winter break?

 

[marukomu]

Crap idea. Just stick all the boring internationals in that period instead.

 

[robinamicrowave]

Why stop with a winter break? They should completely restructure the calendar so that international football is an event that lasts for seven weeks every two years instead of getting in the way every few weeks of the season. For example, the 2020 Euros would impact the season in the following ways:

August 3rd & 10th, 2019 - European leagues start
December 7th & 14th, 2019 - Winter break for European leagues

[THREE WEEK BREAK]

January 4th, 2020 - European leagues come back after the winter break
May 3rd, 2020 - European leagues play their final games

[TWO WEEK BREAK]

May 15th 2020 - Qualifying begins, mini leagues of six teams playing each other once
June 6th, 2020 - Qualifying ends, 16 teams go to the tournament (which is how it should be)
June 12th, 2020 - Euro 2020 begins
July 5th - 2020 - Euro 2020 ends

[FOUR WEEK BREAK]

August 8th & 15th - European leagues start again

It's not perfect but it works better than the system we have now.

 

[haram]

Don't see how a winter break will change much. They have to play the games eventually anyway. Change the format of the league cup so that it is more u23 based instead.

 

[Oo0AahCantona]

They should just do it for a couple seasons so they can realise it’s going to make feckall effect on the national team and revert back.

 

[roonster09]

Wouldnt taking out the league cup create enough dates for a winter break?

I maybe wrong here but don't French league have 2 domestic cups and still have winter break?

Also as it is, they don't have time to accommodate any team playing deeper in Europa, League cup and FA cup, so not sure how can they accommodate winter break without fecking up business end of the season for the team that is in 3 cups.

 

[Snow]

I maybe wrong here but don't French league have 2 domestic cups and still have winter break?

Also as it is, they don't have time to accommodate any team playing deeper in Europa, League cup and FA cup, so not sure how can they accommodate winter break without fecking up business end of the season for the team that is in 3 cups.

Yup. Their smaller cup is only 4 games compared the 6 that City or Arsenal have to play or 7 for the PL teams not involved in Europe.

Would be good to throw that cup out. It's not a pleasant cup for most, it's got a crap history and generally isn't important.

 

[Offside]

I don’t get why the Christmas fixture list is always discussed during this idea as one of the major cons. There is no need to get rid of such a tradition. Just play the Christmas period as normal then have a 3 week break in January. That way there isn’t as much on-pitch disruption for managers during the transfer window either.

 

[11101]

Id be all for that, on the proviso they dont stuff it with round the world money spinning tours or pointless internationals.

They could actually find the dates for free if they ditched all the international friendlies.

 

[Sky1981]

Cut the team to 18. That'll create more rooms across the season.

 

[VeevaVee]

I don't know whether it would be good or bad for player mindsets, but it would be a bit shit for fans.
Does this add weeks to the beginning of the season or something? Just add one or two instead to relieve fixture congestion.

 

[RedSky]

Why stop with a winter break? They should completely restructure the calendar so that international football is an event that lasts for seven weeks every two years instead of getting in the way every few weeks of the season. For example, the 2020 Euros would impact the season in the following ways:


It's not perfect but it works better than the system we have now.

Totally agree. Would be much better.

 

[el3mel]

Just scrap the league Cup. Everything will be fine.

 

[ti vu]

Why stop with a winter break? They should completely restructure the calendar so that international football is an event that lasts for seven weeks every two years instead of getting in the way every few weeks of the season. For example, the 2020 Euros would impact the season in the following ways:


It's not perfect but it works better than the system we have now.

Feck no. The qualifying phase doesn't have many good games. That would bore the Shiite out of everyone with long break before domestic league resume. And what about CL and EL? If the EL and CL are close to qualification, plea yet maybe distracted since they don't want risk injury. It is worse using this.

The point of a dragged out qualifiying phase to giving chance for teams who may get emerging stars change their fortune. Qualification is no tournament.

 

[MrPooni]

Why stop with a winter break? They should completely restructure the calendar so that international football is an event that lasts for seven weeks every two years instead of getting in the way every few weeks of the season. For example, the 2020 Euros would impact the season in the following ways:


It's not perfect but it works better than the system we have now.

I'd rather they switch all international football to the end of the season i.e. 1 week training camps followed by 2 weeks of optional friendlies and 2 weeks of qualifiers. It would allow the league to spread club games out more evenly and eliminate the niggling injuries that usually come from international breaks, would help reduce fixture congestion over winter without taking away festive fixtures altogether and better prepare international sides for post-season tournament football.

 

[Chipper]

Compared to Spain we don't play too much more and their winter break is quite a short one for teams involved in the Copa Del Rey. At least it was this year.

They finished on Dec 23rd, came back for the Copa Del Rey on Jan 4th. 11 days with no matches between the 2 game days. We had 9 the other week ourselves between the Derby Friday nighter and and Stoke games which isn't too different. As we weren't in the Carabao Cup semis we could've played Stoke on the Wednesday and got the 11.

The thing that really buggers us up is FA Cup replays. A team involved in everything will play 1X Community Shield, 6 x FA Cup excluding replays, 6 x Carabao = 13. In Spain it is Super Cup x 2, Copa del Rey x 9 = 11. We start a week earlier, finish a week earlier. Could either start earlier and finish the same date as them or cut out 2 games (Comm Shield + make the Carabao semis one-legged at a neutral venue?) to be able to incorporate the same sort of calendar. The problem still remaining is having to put in extra dates for potential FA Cup replays.

 

[The Don]

Why are the Premier League even entertaining the the thought of a new 'TV deal'? feck TV. An official online Premier League subscription service is the only way to go, now.
Do it the same as netflix. HD streaming at one price tier and 4K streaming (and extra devices) at a higher price tier. All Premier League matches, live and on demand. I'd guess that every single football fan (with internet access) in the UK would subscribe. It would make an absolute fortune and potentially dwarf TV rights deals, eventually.
I mean look at how many people have netflix and (apart from some very good TV shows) there's feck all on it.

I mean, people are already watching 3pm kick offs, whether they like it or not. That is their product. That is their money. Why aren't they cashing in on it?

 

[Samid]

Scrap the double legged LC semis and all FA cup replays.

Then divide the league in two random groups of 10 teams in the middle of January.

Group A: Play in week 1, play in week 2, break in week 3.
Group B: Play in week 1, break in week 2, play in week 3.

So both groups get a full weekend off (14 days between games). The break doesn't feel that long because it isn't simultaneously for all teams.

The TV companies probably won't like games being scrapped. To make up for it I'd take two games from the 3pm kick offs and put them on certain Tuesday and Wednesday nights. Not ideal for fans but they could reduce the travelling impact by having local games that aren't big rivalries (United-Burnley, Arsenal-Palace, West Ham-Watford etc).

 

[manunited1919]

Don't see how a winter break will change much. They have to play the games eventually anyway. Change the format of the league cup so that it is more u23 based instead.

That’s a great idea. Require teams to field a minimum of 6 U23s in the team. It would also create more interest for fans because we will want to see each of our team’s talented kids play In a cup along with first teamers.

 

[ti vu]

That’s a great idea. Require teams to field a minimum of 6 U23s in the team. It would also create more interest for fans because we will want to see each of our team’s talented kids play In a cup along with first teamers.

I hate the idea. The players need to earn their playtime and the managers have to show that it's their own will to put the kids in, not some regulation which they can use as moral high ground as excuse after a defeat.

 

[SqualorVictoria]

Would love it to happen, though mostly because of the reactions of "Keysey" and Collymore.

 

[hasanejaz88]

Wouldnt taking out the league cup create enough dates for a winter break?

Completely agree, I do not see any sense in continuing the competition which most clubs treat as second rate and have little ambition in winning. It ends up increasing the fixture list and bloating the schedule of most teams. The continuous name changes every few years has also increased it's belittling. There already is the prestigious FA cup where smaller clubs can aim to win silverware against the bigger clubs, so there is no point in having a second competition, where some of those lesser teams themselves play weaker teams.

Christmas fixtures is a celebrated past time for English football fans (compared to the dire attendances for EFL fixtures) so rather than removing that, it would be better to remove the EFL Carabao/Carling/Capital One/Worthington Cup to free up some midweeks for the teams.

 

[ZAGREB RED]

If we have a mild winter, people will say oh what's the point of a winter break the weather is fine, if there is a bad winter with a lot of snow and ice etc there will be calls for a mid-winter break. Any PL team still involved in all competitions is going to face an extremely crowded fixture list in the latter part of the season if there is a winter break.

 

[Gio]

Id be all for that, on the proviso they dont stuff it with round the world money spinning tours or pointless internationals.

Aye. Knowing the Premier League’s motives, it’s more likely to be about creating space for friendlies in other continents in the same spirit as the 39th game idea.

 

[Handsome Devil]

It could work except in the unlikely event FIFA were to award the World Cup to some baking hot desert country resulting in another chaotic rearrangement of schedule.....oh wait.

 

[EyeInTheSky]

The most elegant solution is to make the league smaller by cutting out even 2 teams from the league would be effective. That's 4 fewer games right away which means anything up to 2- 4 weeks to play with.

This is the way to cut out fatigue and injuries and allow more time for coaches to train their players as opposed to barely seeing them before or after an international game. This would also help the national sides as well.

 

[Stretch]

It would surely mean either dropping the League Cup in it's entirety which the FA probably won't agree to or making the LC semis 1 leg games and no FA Cup replays. Either way something needs to be done.

 

[B20]

It would mean scrapping the league cup. Which is probably not a bad idea.

 

[Trizy]

Will only benefit clubs in the CL. As for the domestic side of it, everyone has to play the same a mount of games. Unless of course, you're on route to win a cup competition.

No break please, I love the congested Christmas Period.

 

[Rolandofgilead]

It would mean scrapping the league cup. Which is probably not a bad idea.

No it wouldn't. There is only 1 league cup round in Jan when the break is proposed and that is the semi final 2nd leg. Easily moved to dec or Feb.

 

[Viral United]

Winter break only work if there will be no football played.
Otherwise we will going to see friendly matches in some remote countries in winter break.

 

[B20]

No it wouldn't. There is only 1 league cup round in Jan when the break is proposed and that is the semi final 2nd leg. Easily moved to dec or Feb.

It's not just about the games that would be played during the break - Obviously you would re-distribute those games to another time of the season. If you want to make a winter break that is meaningful (ie. alleviate players being overworked), you have to get rid of some games somewhere to avoid unreasonable fixture congestion elsewhere during the season. The league cup is the obvious target. No other countries persevere with a cup trophy that no one really cares if you drop out of.

 

[horsechoker]

Why is everyone proposing weird and radical solutions?

Just put a 3 week break between the third and fourth rounds of the FA Cup. The break will help the quality of football by allowing some rest time for players and time for injuries to heal. Things like FA Cup replays and 2 leg semi finals should be scrapped.

 

[VanGaalEra]

Get rid of the two leg semi finals in the League Cup and scrap replays in the FA Cup. You'll have enough time for a 2 week break in January.

 

[SirAF]

Get rid of the two leg semi finals in the League Cup and scrap replays in the FA Cup. You'll have enough time for a 2 week break in January.

100% agree. Those matches are bollocks.

 

[buchansleftleg]

They have to do something to sort out cramming the World cup in 2022 into late november / early December. If this deal goes upto 2022 then they can't just expect to start the season as normal so some adjustments will have to be made.

I think a break will give English clubs a real chance at progressing further in the Champions league but it will probably mean Stoke get relegated due to visiting teams not visiting their ground on as many "rainy nights"

 

[VanGaalEra]

100% agree. Those matches are bollocks.

Like who gives a shit about the FA Cup replays today and tomorrow. The ratings must be shit too.

 

[SirAF]

Like who gives a shit about the FA Cup replays today and tomorrow. The ratings must be shit too.

If they are televised at all!