Liverpool’s Premier League title charge could be influenced by ongoing coronavirus fears.
Jurgen Klopp’s side have forged a 22-point lead over second-placed Manchester City and are now just four wins away from their first league title in 30 years.
However, with the news that the ongoing global crisis has begun to see widespread sporting postponements and cancellations, fears have grown that the rest of the season could be scrapped.
The Daily Telegraph had reported that if the season was brought to a premature end then Liverpool might miss out on the title, with no guarantees in place to ensure it would be handed to the leaders.
The Liverpool Echo have since got in contact with the Premier League, and they learned that all options would be considered if the season didn’t see out all 38 fixtures.
This is mainly due to their being no preparations for such an event in the Premier League handbook.
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Klopp was asked about the threat posed on football by the coronavirus on Friday, with particular concern on the planned pre-season trip to China.
“For pre-season not yet, we didn’t really think about changing anything from pre-season, but I know that [talks] will happen,” he said.
“First and foremost, it’s led by our medical department, so all the advice, we get from there.
“But you know, if you don’t come in here and don’t shake hands, I’m now two metres away from you—whatever you have, I probably cannot avoid getting it as well.
“We even had an interview outside and we were much closer. I didn’t feel too uncomfortable!
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“We take it really seriously, but we cannot avoid everything, that’s how it is and in the end it’s not a football problem, it’s a society problem, that we all have in common.
“I think everybody’s thinking about it in the moment, and hopefully the much-smarter people than us find a medicine for it.
“Because that’s obviously the biggest problem in the moment, that makes a big difference to other diseases.
“We don’t have that yet, but everybody is working hard on that, and then hopefully it will settle.
“But in the moment we deal with it like all other people, we take it serious, we don’t do some things we maybe usually would do, but that’s the same for us when the flu is going around, we cannot do anything different to that.
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“And I think, really, in the moment everybody takes it seriously.
“We do that as well, so far we haven’t told everybody not to shake hands, but we don’t force anybody to shake hands, we have all the disinfection areas here where you can wash and disinfect our hands.
“Is that enough? I don’t know. We cannot do more than we do actually, and then in the end nobody told us that we don’t have to play football, so as long as that doesn’t happen we will play football.
“It’s a contact sport, don’t forget, and it’s always important that we take things seriously, but that we don’t get crazy about it.
“There are other areas in the world, obviously, where it’s more difficult, and hopefully we find a solution for that really quick, that would be my first concern.”
- Liverpool FC
- Premier League
- Jurgen Klopp
- Sadio Mane
- China
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