The Professional Football League (FLP) announced Friday, September 4 that it had lightened the medical protocol concerning Covid-19 in Ligue 1 and Ligue 2 “In conjunction with the public authorities”, allowing matches as long as twenty out of thirty players tested negative. Until then, matches could be postponed from four cases over eight rolling days in the professional group.
The new protocol specifies in particular “That the matches of Ligue 1 and Ligue 2 will be maintained as long as twenty players (including a goalkeeper) out of a workforce of thirty will be tested negative”. The board of directors of the LFP adopted on Wednesday these adjustments to the medical protocol following “Club requests” and “Feedback from the first two days”.
The Lens-PSG match threatened by the old protocol
“This new protocol applies from [vendredi] “, affirms the LFP, asking “To the clubs of Ligue 1 and Ligue 2 their list of thirty players”. This season, Marseille-Saint-Etienne has been postponed because more than four players from Olympique de Marseille had been infected with the new coronavirus.
The Lens-PSG match, counting for the second day but postponed to September 10, was under the threat of the old protocol, because six Parisian players contracted the Covid-19. “It’s out of the question not to play. If we don’t play the matches, we are jeopardizing our TV rights ”, explains a president of Ligue 1, on condition of anonymity.
“The clubs will not endanger TV rights”, he continues, explaining that it is necessary to spare the new broadcaster, Mediapro, which pays 1.25 billion euros per season. “Mediapro lost a month with these postponements and was unable to broadcast the flagship matches”, insists this leader. “They will end up getting angry …”
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