Premier League Clubs Vote to Return to Action on June 17th

Last week, Premier League teams returned to non-contact training. This week, contact training has resumed. And today, we know that if things continue to go to plan, the league will return to action in three weeks on Wednesday, June 17th.

This following an all-clubs meeting today that saw teams overwhelmingly in favour of pushing ahead with a mid-June return to action, with the plan calling for a pair of mid-week kickoffs: Man City and Arsenal, and Aston Villa and Sheffield.

Those two matches represent games in hand, and getting them out of the way first would put everyone on 29 games—a level playing field. A full slate would then follow on the weekend, possibly starting with a match on Friday, June 19th.

The goal would be to see the season concluded by the first weekend of August, with the FA Cup final to be played on August 8th. A brief offseason would likely follow before the 2020-21 season could be started as soon as reasonably possible.

After the games in hand are played, every team would have nine matches. They would be expected to be played out in order as originally scheduled, across seven weeks, resulting in a rather less congested fixture list than many had feared.

Elsewhere, after a second successful week of German football behind closed doors, Spain’s La Liga has voted to return to action on Thursday, June 11th with a match between Sevilla and Betis. Serie A is also targeting a June return.