Winter break?

[AndyWolves]

Talk again of a winter break being introduced for the premier league. I'm not sure it would work as fixtures would like up elsewhere in the calendar.

What I'd prefer is more common sense over the Christmas fixtures - space them out a bit more

 

[b3h]

I don't get why they've never swapped winter for summer and had the whole of the shitty weather period off. Play through summer when it's nice.

 

[Langers]

I thought the way Sky fucked around with the schedules for TV over Christmas was ridiculous but that's the downside to the gazillions of pounds clubs are given for being in the Premier League.

I don't want a winter break. Winter is shit, dark and depressing enough as it is - I don't want them taking football away on top of all that.

It'll never happen but I'd much rather they allowed 3pm games to be broadcast so the fans aren't inconvenienced all the time before any kind of winter break.

 

[YoungWolf]

I think a winter break would be beneficial (for quality in the league and the national team), but agree initially the fixtures need to be spaced out better. There aren't that many midweek games earlier in the season.

The initial plan in the Premier League when they were reducing teams from 22 to 20 was that they were going to continue down to 18 but the clubs (who were obviously benefitting financially) wanted to keep it at 20. That itself would have helped with less games.

 

[Penk Wolf]

They play less games in the Premier League compared to the Championship, so I see no reason why those 8 games can't be during the winter. Clearly the Spanish trip helped our team.

 

[Tredman]

Never been keen on a winter break, but its been fucking freezing at wolves recently, thinking about it I'd much rather watch football when its warm.

 

[pr0sl0]

I’m in favour of it on the whole, for a few reasons.

If you standardise winter breaks across the top leagues, you can open up a period of time where international friendlies and tournaments can be held without impacting squads. The new European Nations League will feel more like a league if it can be played in a single block, for example, plus it also makes it a lot easier for countries that want to host World Cups to do so when the weather is milder (obviously not Qatar, but just because of the corruption there, it doesn’t negate the fact that the current international calendar is biased in favour of Europe). You also wouldn’t be faced with any players having to choose between internationals and league games a la the African Cup of Nations.

You could even just block out January for it, if the sticking block for people is they don’t want to lose the traditional Christmas fixtures. In return leagues would get back the time currently alotted to in-season international breaks, so it shouldn’t cause fixture congestion.

 

[The Bear]

They play less games in the Premier League compared to the Championship, so I see no reason why those 8 games can't be during the winter. Clearly the Spanish trip helped our team.

Agreed. You could easily move 4 games to midweek earlier in the season to give you a two week break over Christmas.

 

[Tony Towner]

My concern with a Winter Break is clubs would just disappear to the Far East or America and play friendlies rendering it pointless. As Langers pointed Sky scheduling made this year's PL fixtures unbalanced and unfair. All clubs should play on the same day with some games moved forward or later for TV.

 

[Kenny]

Exactly what the main Scottish teams did during their winter break. Think Rangers went and played in Florida

 

[White Wolf]

If we have a winter break then teams are just going to play a load of high-profile friendlies for the money. The Prem has a massive amount of its players going to international tournaments and plenty of those non-English players do fine.

 

[pr0sl0]

I'm not sure if I've read what you're saying correctly, but are you suggesting there's a winter break that you then go and fill with international games/friendlies? Not sure that would be the point.

Yep. If the main concern is to give players a break overall then that's entirely reasonable, but you just know that any winter break is going to end up filled with friendly tournaments held in Dubai or China or the US - just like the summers without international tournaments are now, with the big teams playing pseudo-tournaments in hot countries.

What's going to be interesting here is that it does somewhat force the clubs to reveal their intentions. If they support a break because they worry about players getting too tired and susceptible to injury, then they also shouldn't mind not being allowed to play those silly fake tournaments at the same time...

 

[Johnny75]

Yep. If the main concern is to give players a break overall then that's entirely reasonable, but you just know that any winter break is going to end up filled with friendly tournaments held in Dubai or China or the US - just like the summers without international tournaments are now, with the big teams playing pseudo-tournaments in hot countries.

What's going to be interesting here is that it does somewhat force the clubs to reveal their intentions. If they support a break because they worry about players getting too tired and susceptible to injury, then they also shouldn't mind not being allowed to play those silly fake tournaments at the same time...

I like this idea, means you could hold a world cup mid season too if you wanted for warmer climates/ southern hemisphere. International friendlies would be rightly binned and we could all care about club football for longer periods of time.

 

[Aikiwolf]

I don't mind the idea of a winter break, however I do struggle to see what the fans get out of it?

With something like VAR, which I don't agree with, I can see what fans think they get out of it but I think a winter break is purely for teams to add in a couple of friendlies.

 

[Derby Wolf]

SSN suggested earlier it might also require the FA Cup becoming midweek tournament.

Massive stumbling block for me.

 

[Paddingtonwolf]

It's bollocks. Have more midweek games earlier. And fuck off the stupid international breaks early in the season. And then no more than three games between 20 December and 5 January.

 

[b3h]

I still say none would be way better ^_^

 

[StuardoWulf]

SSN suggested earlier it might also require the FA Cup becoming midweek tournament.

Massive stumbling block for me.

Seems stupid to waste a Saturday on Fa Cup that even fans don't want to put a first team out. Us older people have to get used to the fact that the cups are reserve team tournaments so really ain't worth much. Although wolves have had decent fa cup attendances (this due to the lack of availability of matchplay tickets in the league) they are not the norm and some clubs can barely sell 25%. Swansea was virtually empty for instance.

Sent from my D6503 using Tapatalk

 

[Boozad]

If they put all the FA Cup fixtures back to Saturday 15:00 like they used to be then it would probably free up three weeks to move a league fixture or two to ease the congestion in December. It doesn’t bother anybody that teams are playing three times in seven days when the Champions League is running so I’m not sure why it’s a problem for league games over Christmas. Again it’s just a reminder that TV money rules the game now.

 

[GLASGOWOLF]

Exactly what the main Scottish teams did during their winter break. Think Rangers went and played in Florida

Indeed. As soon as the winter break happens teams will jet of and play money making matches abroad.