,..... aaaand normal service is resumed.

I'm not debating the decision to suspend matches and if things get worse, hopefully not, the season is altered some how. Lives are at stake. It's "only" a game. That said, you have to feel for Liverpool. Historic title run, 30 years in the making and its done in the highest fashion and its marred.

I shouldn't as a gooner but I like them. Might have been my side at one time (with Palace). Not that I'm not happy with my choice. As the saying goes, your club chooses you. The Arsenal has made my adult given my adult life a second childhood of which I can't thank the football gods more. All the ups and downs of supporting this club and it has been more ups than downs. Which makes us luckier than the vast amount of supporters.

Yawn.

A few people have commented that it's getting real in response to the suggestion that COVID 19 is being over-hyped.

Here's my current version of real.....I sat next to a work colleague for 30mins at a meeting on Wednesday. I came into work yesterday morning to learn that she was now self-isolating and waiting to be tested because her partner tested positive on Wednesday evening.

My 92 year old father suffered a mild stroke 3 weeks ago. He is back in his own house this week. I am his only proper family support. I have to now try my best to apply the contact guidelines but obviously have to keep calling to him. If he contracts COVID19, he is unlikely to survive it.

Still, probably best to let it all pass naturally rather than wrecking the world. *%^@*** hell.

Best wishes to you and your dad, Dec. It's getting a bit frightening.

Best wishes to your father dec.

Could someone be hasn’t blocked tell him the big majority of his posts are ignored. So why is that bullying? Sounds more like him wanting to act like a victim, even though he’s not.

Like who?

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p086hj ... PNoFevfIHs

This is about 6 minutes long. Someone with actual credentials saying some of what the plans might be and what we know. Which is not very much.

I’m so sorry for your situation Dec.

Good luck to you and your father. Just got up here in Aus and I have a runny nose but no other symptoms. But this often happens with my sinus problems. But I won't visit my 90yo mother in the nursing home this weekend and will contact my mate who I was meeting for coffee. His sister lives with him and has cancer. Make him aware that I probably have the usual sinus problem that I have had for about 10 years but I need to make him aware in case he wants to cancel.

The sooner the FA make the call and cancel the season the better I believe.

It’s hard to see how any other outcome is possible. I listen to Talksport and they were discussing this. Someone argued that the season should be completed by playing games behind closed doors. But each club will take significant numbers of people to games including players (including those who won’t play), managers, coaches, medical and physio staff and no doubt others. That could add up to loads. There will be telly crew and media as well. Club directors will be there as well. Any number of whom could already have it.

Maybe the season has to be cancelled. Bad luck for Liverpool and bloody lucky for Norwich and Bournemouth. But what else can be done? Who do you choose to go in the Champions League because any number have a realistic chance including Arsenal?

Unless you just accept everyone is going to catch it and just carry on shopping, working and doing countless other daily activities including going to mass attendance events. The huge majority including Arteta will live. Sadly a number will die earlier than they otherwise would. Do we have to accept it?

Surely you can’t just shrug your shoulders and say oh well we can’t stop people dying so back on for all sporting events and that’s life. Your talking about killing 200,000 people. Souls, parents, grandparents. That’s an unacceptable loss, an effort of trying to prevent the spread surely had to be put in place. *%^@ the football, seriously *%^@ it.

The argument againest this Herd Immunity suggestion

https://twitter.com/channel4news/status ... 94240?s=21

I would rather the season be cancelled. But stopping people going to football matches isn’t going to stop the spread of the virus. Football is a side issue that you shouldn’t overemphasise the importance of.

People have to shop to get the food to stay alive, and they have to work so they can afford to buy the food to keep them alive. That routinely involves coming into contact with other people. It does for me, my wife, my children, and the huge majority of people. Don’t get diverted by the ‘should football be played with no fans in the ground’ question. It’s a side issue.

I think it’s tragic a small minority of people will die earlier than they would otherwise have done. But playing games behind closed doors will not stop that.

Isolation stops the spread. As much of it as possible. If you have 60 thousand people mingling and integrating in a small area of course you are enabling the spread of the virus.

Your right closed doors still enables the spread of the virus but on a much smaller level, probably a good few hundred rather than thousands. You can’t stop people buying food and essentials but there are measures to reduce exposure that have been ignored.

To achieve herd immunity you need to infect 60% of the population, that means putting around 5 million in hospital to be treated and killing 200 to 400 thousand people.

Whatever anybody thinks, football is cancelled until April 3 at the earliest, and almost certainly for longer. I am also reading that we should expect the government to ban mass gatherings very soon, early next week probably. All we can do is try to take the advice given, and keep the inevitable number of new cases each day as low as possible.
It's uncharted territory obviously, and while everyone has an opinion, none of us know how this is going to play out. I certainly fear for my elderly parents.

How many people attend football matches? A pretty tiny proportion of the population would be my guess, and I’d bet my life savings on it. Think of the countless millions who have to come into contact with others for different reasons. Sorry, I honestly think you’re being diverted from the reality of the situation. As I’ve said, my own choice would be to abandon the season. But do I think that would save anyone from dying from the virus? Probably not.

Isolation is very difficult. Have Arteta, Moyes or Hudson-Odoi sent their families away while they’re self-isolating? They’re all so stinking rich they could afford to. But I still doubt it. The huge majority don’t have their wealth, making it impossible.

Zika, SERS, MERS, even Ebola to some extent came and went and with the latter, resurfaced periodically and was in isolated areas. This one has the feeling we will be living with it from now on. That it may become like the flu and hit us hard seasonally. Worse yet, mutate into affecting groups that it didn't prior. It has that feel to it. I pray not obviously but it has a 'We're not in Kansas anymore" feel to it.

And with it we change socially and perhaps culturally. The only relatable feeling I have that is somewhat similar is after 911. I felt so badly for my nephews and younger family members that they would grow up in a world where terrorism is the norm and events such as that would happen periodically. And then I became angry at the role we played if you connect the dots back (CIA, etc.).

I now have a fear for young people who will not have the childhood I had. As well as fear for myself when I enter the group most susceptible.

We, meaning the whole world, are in damage control only. The best we can hope is to lessen the numbers who die, not eliminate the risk. Even here, in Townsville (population 180,000 with no known cases yet) it is smaller crowds going to the supermarket . What i don't understand is why we had the rugby league match go ahead. Government mismanagement. Let us learn lessons from China/Korea and Italy. How to try and stop that growth graph in China/Korea as opposed to acting too late in Italy. The numbers in Italy given the population are terribly high compared with the numbers in China.

Sorry sending their families away would in my opinion only help to spread it. The family are infected or potentially affected so they need to stay home.

I miss Brexit

I visited a mall yesterday. The air con affected me after coming in from the heat and I felt a sneeze and got scared. I fought it and was desperately looking for a bathroom or somewhere private to sneeze and not scare anyone.

We may sadly get to a place where a cough or sneeze or even sniffle in public spaces will get you a public shunning.

Strange times.

i'd like to see the FA meet with all the PL owners and grant Liverpool the title. I can only imagine if that were us. Yeah, I know I'll get backlash for saying that and it won't be the most popular post on here but, they were hard done by in all fairness. It was necessary to put lives over football but they were the biggest casualty of an ended season.

Take care Dec

AG, for your reading pleasure

I was bullied at school too. And I was home schooled.

'straightens tie ...'

lol...you sound like Rodney Dangerfield.

Hi Dec,

I'm very sorry to hear about your father's stroke. It is very difficult to cope with the everyday needs of the elderly whilst at the same time keeping them safe from potential infection. I hope that things work out well for you and him.

The whole situation is a complete nightmare.

Really ! On the basis the Arsenal manager himself is infected and probably has infected others in the camp? That type of situation isn’t increased if you put huge crowds into the mix,

There’s a reason they are cancelling the large gatherings now.

Our government started off by dealing with this well, now they have reverted to full blown Tory mode where they will kill any amount of poor people to try and stop damage to the economy

Suck my massive, spunky .....

Haha

Welcome back Abu. I've missed your thoughtful, considered contributions.

We have all seen movies that take this current crisis to an extreme level. I'm being told in America, toilet paper is a luxury item now. People are actually on craigslist selling it at marked up prices.

Every country with cases are spending money on it, and it will be in the billions if it hasn't already. It will turn to trillions soon enough. Trump has infused the share markets with 1.5 billion to prop it up and give the veneer that the drop is controllable and we will go back to 'normal' whatever "normal" is and "normal" wasn't great either. It's not only the health issue but the economic impact that is also very worrisome. You can avoid the virus but be out of job if its a job interacting with the public. The lasting economic impact is worrying.

In previous crashes due to an economic bubble or war, wars end and we have a history of what do and not to do in recessions or depressions, like in 2008.

How do you come back from a steep recession when people aren't interacting? How does Tesco, Marks & Spencer, keep people on payroll if a very reduced number of people are going there? This is new and the lack of public interaction makes an economic recovery extremely difficult. Economists haven't dealt with this. Sure, we have places like Zaire and other African countries that had ebola but their economies were already fragile. Not much of a road back to the norm after the scare is over when the economy was poor to begin with.

Western and industrialized nations haven't had to encounter this. Where is the blueprint? We are far more interconnected now than we have ever been in the history of mankind.

Our leaders have a lot to mull over. A lot. This situation is one of the reasons you vote for who you vote for. To keep a level head and seek wise counsel. I don't know enough of Boris Johnson, Merkel and others to make an informed opinion but I do know for sure we have the wrong man for the times. In 2016 Hillary Clinton once said "I'm the only thing between you and an apocalypse" and people thought she was being hyperbolic. She said she had been around ex Presidents, foreign leaders and even the ones in the opposition party she knew they were always going to do what was best for the people. Even if she didn't agree with the foreign leader they were going to do the wise thing for the betterment of their people. She knew Trump for years. Everyone did. He was a known entity to politicians and the elite. They knew he didn't have the wherewithal for the job and that he had a massive ego and was a narcissist. He only acted in his own self interest. He didn't expect to win from all reports and was as surprised as everyone he actually won the d@mn thing.

His decisions are based on re-election. That is the scary thing. The rumours are his advisers are pleading, suggesting, anything they can to have him focus on what is needed and not what is expedient. I wasn't a fan of Hillary Clinton but she was right. And what is much, much scarier than Trump is that his sycophants are enabling him. Fox News, which polling says are almost exclusively what his supporters watch are exasperating the issue. Giving bad health advise, minimizing the enormity, suggesting criticism is based on ending his presidency.

If at anytime, the UN and world leaders need to share information, concerns and find any and all common ground to help us all, it is now.

Thanks for the good wishes, folks.

Pity we have no Arsenal performances to distract us from whatever is facing us in the next few weeks and months.

Have to agree.
https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/51889682
Coronavirus: Premier League 4 April return hard to imagine - Brighton chief executive

In a strange way the world could use the distraction. So many variables. How many fans will show up? How will it affect the play on the field? I recall when Magic Johnson had HIV came back to play and the first rough incident where there may have been blood was a 'hold your breath' moment.

The virus may become the norm. It may be something we have to deal with on an ongoing basis and if its close to the flu, then it will have a season where its prominent, likely the same as the regular flu season, the winter months.

So many different things to consider. Anyway, that April 4th date seems an arbitrary one for the league to do a 'wait and see'.

I suspect football as we know it will change forever. I think that a lot of teams particularly in the lower leagues are just hanging on week to week. This could be the end for them with. I am not sure we won’t have some problems as well.

If they called the EPL null and void as from now would you have any objection if the teams current position determined CL and Europa League places for next year. It would be totally against us as we would not qualify but personally I would not object. And maybe those comps will not happen in any event. Liverpool would not be awarded the title and I would not relegate anyone, promote 3 and next year 4 would go down and 4 down in the following 2 years.

By the way this is a recommendation from me. I had booked an overseas holiday and had to cancel last week. Where I was entitled to refunds, a couple of places responded immediately upon my cancellation and refunded me within days. A shout out to Booking.com, Mytrips and Caminoways. I wish I could say the same about some other big companies who really played some games. Yep will still drop a lot of money in non-refundable things but its a first world problem. All the people who will lose their jobs or lives across the world are the hard done by. But just thought I would pay tribute to those that were good to deal with.

I would support that decision fully, if your idea was implemented. Tough on the teams trying to get promoted and what a piece of luck for Norwich and others likely to go down. But if it stops Liverpool winning the league, that’s great. American said he hoped the other clubs would get together and agree to award them the title. I don’t. Stuff Liverpool.

If the season is declared null and void, no league results should count. It should be a full rewind to the end of last season. That would be very tough on Liverpool, Leeds and West Brom, but I think it is the fairest approach.

If this goes on for months, I think the days of huge salaries and transfer fees might be gone, at least for a while. Clubs are all losing revenue and the tv companies that generate so much income for the clubs will lose millions in advertising revenue.

People still talking about if this season will go ahead ?

Id talk about next season. Your going to need a substantial effort of sterilisation and isolation required to bring it under control that may stem several months. This hasn’t even peaked in the U.K yet and our tactics are completely reactionary.

The government seem to be abdicating decisions and leaving them to the private sector. Simply incredible

Nevermind if Liverpool will win the league or not, this is going to affect sport for a while. William hill have resorted to taking bets on the weather