Well, I know what I’ll be doing on weekend mornings from now on.
Following a 10-week hiatus, my favourite European soccer league – the German Bundesliga – returned over the Victoria Day long weekend, marking the first major professional sports league to resume operations amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
Understandably, the return comes with dozens of health and safety protocols in place to help limit the potential spread of the virus. The German soccer association drafted a dossier with more than pages outlining how the Bundesliga will operate under "the new normal."
For example, the games are played without fans in attendance, and a maximum of just 300 people – players, team staff, security guards, broadcasting personnel, etc. – are allowed into the stadiums. A concern of the German soccer association was that fans would still congregate outside the stadiums on matchdays, so rules are in place to abandon matches if that happens.
Those not playing are required to wear masks in the stands, and substitutes must be sitting at least two metres away from each other. Everyone who enters the stadium has their temperature checked prior to the game, and players are tested for COVID-19 at least twice a week. There are also rules for how players are transported to and from stadiums and staggered change-times are set up in the dressing rooms, which are disinfected during and after the games. Soccer balls are also disinfected throughout the games.
Of course, as we saw this past weekend, these measures were mostly negated the minute the games kicked off. Players still flew into tackles and there was plenty of man-to-man marking on corner kicks, throw-ins and free kicks. While players didn’t partake in the traditional pre-game handshakes, coin toss or team photographs, and while they were told to not high-five or embrace teammates following a goal, they still exchanged plenty of circumstantial contact.
Prior to COVID-19, watching the Bundesliga was a cherished Saturday and Sunday morning tradition for me. Like many sports fans, the loss of that ritual was a frustrating consequence of the pandemic. While I am excited to watch the games again, I am also nervous the return has come too soon, and the potential for a COVID-19 breakout among the teams still exists. We’ve already seen one club – Dynamo Dresden in the second division – enter quarantine because one or more of their players tested positive.
As dozens of pro sports leagues plan for their eventual return – including those in North America – many eyes will be on the Bundesliga in coming weeks, to study the effect of the new regulations. Hopefully, the experiment is a success, players and staff remain healthy and the Bundesliga becomes a model blueprint to follow.
