England’s leading players face the prospect of an endless winter with competitive top-level fixtures scheduled for 52 consecutive weekends once the Premiership season restarts on 14 August with Sale’s visit to Harlequins.
Premiership Rugby have confirmed the 2020-21 campaign will commence on 21 November with England also hoping to play internationals on each of the preceding four weekends, including a fixture within 24 hours of the rescheduled Premiership final on 24 October.
With the final Test of the 2021 Lions series in South Africa in the diary for 7 August and the 2021-22 season kicking off six weeks later, every calendar month for the next two years is filling up.
With the consequences of the Covid‑19 crisis heaping intense financial pressure on administrators, Premiership clubs will also find themselves playing midweek matches when the league resumes. In order to ensure every game of the 2019-20 campaign is completed, there will be three midweek rounds with clubs now committed to playing seven games in 28 days.
There will even be Premiership rugby on a Monday night for the first time, commencing on bank holiday Monday next month with Bath’s home game against Wasps.
How to sidestep player burnout remains a subject under discussion, with the possibility of individual playing time limits having to be enforced. With Premiership Rugby facing a huge shortfall in broadcasting revenue if the games are not played, its chief executive, Darren Childs, said the decision to complete the season was unanimous.
“Every single club is totally supportive of the schedule and very excited that we have managed to find a way,” he said. “Many other leagues have not taken that choice but we think we’ve found a way of doing it safely.”
With 10 players and staff having tested positive for Covid-19 earlier this week, there remains an obvious danger of disruption caused by renewed outbreaks. Either way the revised fixture list is so tightly packed games that have to be called off cannot be replayed. “There is no space to reschedule games, so if we get into a situation where a club can’t field a team we will have to come up with a solution,” said Phil Winstanley, the PRL rugby director.
Premiership Rugby insists the positive test ratio is “in line with infections” and that if one player tests positive it does not necessarily mean an entire team will have to be quarantined.
With a gap of 159 days between the resumption date and the suspension of the league in March, several teams will have a reshuffled look whatever unfolds. London Irish need a temporary new home as they will be unable to host games either at the Madejski Stadium or their new shared ground in Brentford, while Leicester have confirmed Manu Tuilagi is among the players who will not be returning to the club after declining a reduced contract offer.
