Elite-level soccer is back

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This article was published 15/05/2020 (2261 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

There is something pleasantly appropriate about European football making its return at the Westfalenstadion. Four other matches will kick off at the same time, but none of them will have anything near the appeal of Borussia Dortmund vs. Schalke — the glamour game of elite-level professional sports’ return to action, to screens, to a weary public desperate for distraction amidst a worldwide pandemic.

More than 81,000 seats will be empty at the iconic arena, but with La Liga, the Premier League and Serie A only tentatively arranging their returns for next month, an audience in the hundreds of millions will overflow the Yellow Wall and transform the ground into a uniquely global stadium.

Bayern Munich CEO Karl-Heinz Rummenigge is expecting around a billion weekend viewers, and many of them will have already planned their Saturday around this Revierderby (8:30 a.m., Sportsnet).

In a Wednesday interview with the German daily SportBild, Rummenigge also heaped praise on his country’s politicians, medical experts and public health officials, thanking them “first for slowing the spread of the coronavirus so dramatically with their careful measures,” and secondly “for their careful review of (German football’s) plan and their permission to play again based on it.”

Immediately after suspending its season on March 16, the Bundesliga began to plot out its return. In consultation with leading scientists and local and national policy-makers, it put forward a strategy that would allow for the league’s resumption once a certain public health threshold was met and permission granted by the authorities. Chancellor Angela Merkel effectively gave the go-ahead last week.

Anticipating the decision, the 36 clubs of Germany’s top two divisions had already quarantined themselves in hotels, and full-contact training was permitted shortly thereafter. Rival leagues in Spain, England and Italy will now watch closely as Germany sets the template — one that may also be replicated by North America’s professional sports.

“It was fantastic to finally get the confirmation,” Dortmund striker Erling Haaland told the club’s YouTube channel. With nine goals in eight Bundesliga matches after making a January move from Red Bull Salzburg, the 19-year-old Norway international will make his first Revierderby appearance today and is hoping to pick up where he left off before the suspension of games owing to COVID-19.

“I’ve been training hard during this time without being in training, so I’m not worried,” he said.

Sixth-place Schalke go into the derby just a point above Wolfsburg and Freiburg in the table. Dortmund, in second spot, are a rival they won’t catch, but a win at the home of their arch rivals would give them local bragging rights and help them retain the final Europa League berth in the process.

“I’m very excited,” Schalke winger Daniel Caligiuri remarked in an interview with Bundesliga.com.

“We’re excited simply because football is restarting, and the fact that the first game back is a derby makes it all the more exciting.”

The 32-year-old, who needs just a single goal to tie Kevin Kuranyi’s club record for Revierderby tallies, also shed some light on the day-to-day activities of locked-down athletes. Reflecting that the preventative restrictions have the feel of a training camp, he also pointed out that continued, persistent adherence to the guidelines is vital “to see this through.”

“We have to keep the regulations. That includes wearing a mask, keeping our distance, washing our hands and being alone in our rooms,” said Caligiuri. “Most of us will be napping in the afternoon and in the evening; we have dinner at a distance. Apart from that, we each have to take care of ourselves because we’re alone in our rooms.”

Recognizing that many players won’t have maintained adequate fitness during the pause in the schedule — something Bayern manager Hansi Flick confirmed on Friday — the Bundesliga will allow an additional two substitutions for the nine remaining match-days.

That, and the use of individual water bottles, will be the only in-game modification for players and teams. Rigorous testing and tracing will be employed before and after matches, and it will all combine, according to Special Match Operations Task Force member Dr. Tim Meyer, “to guarantee an as-low-as-possible likelihood of infection transmission on the pitch.”

Having designed what they believe is a safe, sustainable restart model, the task force is also relying on local fans to keep from congregating at or around the stadium. Dortmund police will retain a presence outside the Westfalenstadion for the derby, and its chief has reminded supporters “to show that the decision for the restart was no mistake.”

He’ll almost certainly be obeyed.

‘It was fantastic to finally get the confirmation. I’ve been training hard during this time without being in training’– Dortmund’s Erling Haaland

Germany’s response to the pandemic hasn’t been perfect, but its COVID-19 caseload has been largely managed —and deaths mostly prevented — by both a health-care system with adequate capacity and a public that adhered to the government’s orders, even socializing responsibly in public parks upon their reopening more than a month ago.

In other words, Germany is the envy of Europe and the Bundesliga the envy of European football.

That it is the first of the major divisions to resume competition is primarily a public health achievement, although the DFL has also set the standard in terms of meticulously planning for and carefully implementing a kickoff strategy.

La Liga is about a month behind the Bundesliga in this regard, and next week Serie A will discuss a possible June return.

The Premier League is the laggard — the result of absent central leadership from league administration, scattershot lockdown policies among the clubs and a government that has bungled its pandemic measures at every opportunity.

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That the Bundesliga would lead the way was inevitable. That Borussia Dortmund — a club known for its confident cool and social progressivism — will serve as the spiritual host of football’s return is eminently fitting. Its flashy team, and its local rivals, will bring the entertainment; the Westfalenstadion will provide the venue for celebration, however modest and virtual.

This is Germany, after all.

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