It's really tough embracing this strange version of football but we must live with it

The German Bundesliga returned a couple of weeks back and La Liga followed soon after. But it is the English premier league which only this week gingerly emerged from its 100-day hiatus, that has awakened us from our own hibernation. For the first time in three months, it really feels like the lockdown imposed by the Coronavirus crisis is starting to lift – like things are gradually returning to normal.
There is a lot that is still amiss, and somethings have probably changed forever. But for those of us for who football is a vent, we have been invited to go back to our brotherhood of men, where without the fear of judgement, we can talk about football all week, on the internet, on vibrant football forums, and on Radio phone-in programmes.

And for those who don’t mind placing a punt, online betting is back too, and it appears David Luiz is unchanged – still making a killing for those who place money on a glut of goals.
However, we are by no means beyond the Coronavirus crisis and we surely won’t be allowed to relive the fellowship of pubs just yet. And from what I saw on Wednesday night I am not sure watching in a noisy pub would make much of a difference anyway. It is live football yes, but without real fans in the stands, the game is just a silent and strange version of the original.

Without the vocal reactions of a real crowd, the games look like training-sessions, something that the general lack of fitness amongst the players doesn’t help.
The lack of familiar sounds also makes it necessary for us to concentrate fully all the time. It is hard work, especially if it is latenight and a team you couldn’t bother with.
And if like me, watching football on a couch at home is always an invitation to nod off, then you stand a risk of missing entire games because the heightened excitement from the crowd that acted as a prompt in the past, is missing.
Of course, production crews have improvised, but the noise is as fake as the computer-generated fans that Spanish TV has been toying with. It can never compare to the real thing and the rhythm is almost always, off.

For instance, at the game between Aston Villa and Sheffield United on Wednesday night, belated cheers accompanied every goal attempt and there were many odd ones too – a home crowd doesn’t cheer a refereeing decision that favours the visiting team. This will probably improve with time.
But as we wait for the Coronavirus crisis to blow over and for football and all else to return to their true original versions, we had better accept what we have now. Maybe this is the new normal we were warned about and advised to embrace.

We were told that we would wake up to a new world where nothing stayed the same. A lot has certainly happened over the last three months for that not to hold true.

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