The Biggest Serie A Game Of The Year Is Being Played Behind Closed Doors Due To Coronavirus Scare
MILAN (AP) — The Serie A game between Juventus and Inter Milan will take place in an empty stadium because of the virus outbreak in Italy, the league confirmed Thursday.
Serie A’s governing body released a statement announcing that Sunday’s Derby d’Italia — one of the biggest games of the season — and four others would be played without any fans allowed in.
The other matches are Udinese vs. Fiorentina on Saturday, AC Milan vs. Genoa, Parma vs. Spal, and Sassuolo vs. Brescia on Sunday.
Well at least its a step in the right direction considering that games in Northern Italy (Inter/Sampdoria, Atalanta/Sassuolo) were just canceled last weekend. This weekend they're deciding to just play the games in effected areas behind closed doors. No fans - traveling nor home - will be allowed in the stadium. Almost any other weekend and this would be fine, no one would complain or anything. However, this weekend has serious title implications for the league. Inter Milan has to travel to Torin (area of concern) to play Juventus in the battle of ex-Chelsea bosses.
Inter is six points behind Juve with a game in hand, so the result of the game is MASSIVE in terms of the title race. So to have to play this in front of an empty Allianz Stadium is nothing short of disappointing. It's gonna be pretty sad to see 40,000 vacant seats considering that this exact fixture set an attendance record for the stadium back in 2018 with 41,495 fans packed in to watch Derby d'Italia. To be honest, that's one of the best parts of watching soccer, you can feel the energy within stadiums despite being on your couch. That's where all the emotion of the game comes from, the players feed off the crowd far more often than not.
Not to mention, Juventus manager Maurizo Sarri is quite firmly on the hot seat with reports coming out today that he is a big loss away from being sacked. One would assume that if they lose to Inter this weekend, it could be the final nail in the coffee for everyone's favorite chain-smoking manager. Kind of a bad look for all the Chelsea fans who have been crying that the club shouldn't have fired him for an inexperienced manager despite calling for his head less than a year ago. Funny how that works, isn't it.
Inter actually played a game in front of an empty San Siro on Thursday because of Coronavirus concerns.
It's just so sad to see such a big stadium with no one in it. I had to do a double-take on all of the goals inter scored because it was so quiet that I had thought there was an offsides call or something. Nope, it turns out there was just nobody there.
There's not much more they can do other than reschedule the games. That wouldn't really make any sense. Who even knows when this coronavirus thing will clear up and they can actually let fans back in? Nobody. They'd probably just end up postponing a shit ton of games for virtually no reason. I just hope the game still lives up to expectations and they can open up the doors soon with no worries of the entire stadium getting the fucking coronavirus.
PS - I don't care if they tried changing the name to COVID-19, I'm always gonna remember it as coronavirus.