A-League season ready to resume
The A-League has been forced to delay its season restart, but it’s COVID-19 nightmare is almost over.
The A-League has been forced to delay its season restart, but it’s COVID-19 nightmare is almost over.
Having waited 112 painful days since Newcastle Jets defeated Melbourne City before the shutdown, fans will have a further 24 hours to twiddle their thumbs with the season restart now set to take place on Friday.
A second scheduling reshuffle, to be announced on Tuesday, will be required to complete the season, but for now the A-League will kick off with a title showdown between leaders Sydney FC and third-placed Wellington Phoenix.
With all three Melbourne teams currently in quarantine after crossing the border into NSW on Saturday, the scheduled season re-opener between Victory and Western United on Thursday has been postponed.
A full revised schedule for the remaining 26 games, and the finals series, will be released by Football Federation Australia on Tuesday.
“We have faced many challenges over the past week since we released the original match schedule and it will need a few tweaks to reschedule the Melbourne teams considering their relocation to Sydney,” said FFA’s Head of Leagues O’Rourke.
“Under the conditions of the exemption from the NSW Government, Melbourne City FC, Melbourne Victory and Western United FC will undergo a 14-day quarantine period before being able to re-join the competition which has meant we have had to update our match schedule accordingly.
“The final schedule will be released (on Tuesday) with no impact to this weekend’s games and minimal changes excepting Melbourne based teams.”
In a positive for fans, O’Rourke confirmed that the gates will be opened to the public — allowing for small crowds, as have been welcomed to NRL and AFL matches in recent weeks.
“Fans will be able to attend selected matches in line with government guidelines and I look forward to the teams returning to the business of playing football,” he said.
“We are now focused on finishing what we started.”
Monday’s confirmation means that defending champions Sydney FC could be crowned premiers — for finishing the regular season on top of the table — in the first game back.
The Sky Blues, who finished second in the regular season last year before downing Perth Glory in the grand final, hold an eight-point lead over second-placed Melbourne City.
However, with a superior goal difference and six games up their sleeve compared to City’s three, Sydney FC need just one draw to finish above the southern upstarts.
Phoenix are 12 points back in third but, like Sydney, have six games still to play — but a win to Sydney FC at Jubilee Stadium on Friday would end the first-past-the-post title challenge completely.
“Mathematically we still can (finish first at the end of the regular season). Anything can happen,” Phoenix striker Jaushua Sotirio told News Corp.
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