Should the Premier League introduce a winter break?

Sport360 staff 08:50 28/12/2015
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  • Intense: Festive football.

    While many of Europe’s leagues have taken a break over the past couple of weeks, the Premier League has continued apace with its traditional festive calendar of fixtures.

    It may just be a couple of fixtures, but it is a high-intensity schedule often seen as influential on a club’s final finishing position in the league table. It can generate great momentum, while the games themselves are some of the most-watched of the entire season.

    However, there is an argument to say that the quality of play late in the season would benefit from a mid-season break to allow players time to recuperate and ready themselves for another push.

    Today’s #360debate is: Should the Premier League introduce a winter break?

    James Piercy, Deputy Editor, says YES

    For better or worse, tradition is something that permeates all aspects of English society. As the national game, football’s festive fixture dates back to, well, essentially when the game began.

    The first-ever match between two separate clubs was on December 26, 1860, in Sheffield between Hallam FC and Sheffield FC. But 155 years down the line it’s about time both the Football Association and Premier League looked at the calendar and thought about the future, instead of the past.

    As much as fans, players and managers to an extent may enjoy it, four games inside 13 days in cold and unpredictable conditions is verging on sadistic. The rest of European football must look on with bemusement as by contrast the gaps between their respective most recent and next fixtures are marked.

    In La Liga – 10 days, Serie A – 16 days, Ligue 1 – 19 and in the Bundesliga a considerable 33. The benefits to the physical and mental well-being of managers and players must be enormous, especially in an age where pressure is so magnified and the intensity and importance placed on football greater than ever.

    With training camps for the European Championships likely to begin two weeks after the final day of the Premier League season, English-based players in action in France won’t have a significant period of rest until late June, at best. That’s 10 months of solid football and between 50 and 70 games for the very best footballers.

    Fatigue has been a continuing issue for the England national team at major tournaments (with 14 of his likely Euro 2016 squad drawn from the EPL maybe Belgium manager Marc Wilmots should also be concerned), but one that is always ignored, except for the brief post-mortem after the Three Lions prematurely crash out.

    As fun as it is to have so much football at this time of year, it’s about time we all took a breather.

    Alex Rea, reporter, says NO

    Jurgen Klopp says it’s necessary the Premier League introduce a winter break. Louis van Gaal goes one step further and calls it evil that there isn’t one in the first place. Truthfully, it’s an insult to supporters that they are being told a lay-off is required.

    The demolition derby nature of the festive period is arguably the only time of year that the Premier League gives something back to its loyal fans. It’s a great tradition.

    When the fixture list is released, you can be sure that the games from Boxing Day through to New Years Day are ones highlighted. And while some managers will whine about the issues around fatigue others just ‘get it’.

    Arsene Wenger said earlier this season: “I would cry if you changed that because it’s part of English tradition and English football. It’s a very important part of us being popular in the world, that nobody works at Christmas and everybody watches the Premier League.”

    Not often can you agree with the Frenchmen but here he is right.

    While the four other major European leagues enjoy their two-three week lay off, the Premier League becomes the focus of the football world. It’s why when the TV rights are up for auction this year’s £5.1 billion pay-out could well be dwarfed again.

    Yes, it does explain the Premier League’s reluctance to see the schedule changed because the festive period is one of its biggest selling points. But it’s the same billions pumped in that has created one of the most competitive, if not weird, seasons to date.

    It’s not even just the financial and traditional aspects either. It’s a matter of practicality – when would the games be played?

    Richard Scudamore, the Premier League chief executive, summed up the argument in an interview with the Daily Telegraph in 2012, saying: “If you were running a theatre and had 380 nights that you wanted to sell, why would throw 60 or 70 of those nights away?”

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