Paris (AFP)
The round balloon will rarely have turned so much in the middle of summer ... Coronavirus obliges, the European cups resume from Wednesday and until the end of August in formats of an unprecedented density promising spectacle but also heat and traffic jams calendars.
. Five-star epilogue for a unique season
What a royal plateau! Neymar, Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi battling in the middle of August: the casting is as improbable as it is dreamed of, as this period in football is much more often synonymous with resumption of national championships than a breathless epilogue of the European Cups.
But the coronavirus has reshuffled the cards. Postponed to mid-March, the end of the final stages of the Champions League and the Europa League has been rescheduled at the end of this extended 2019-2020 season, to give the national leagues time to complete their championships while respecting health constraints. ... and also save the juicy television rights of the C1, UEFA's flagship product.
It is therefore just before the start of the school year that the most anticipated matches of the season will take place, at a frantic pace leading to the grand final of the C1, scheduled for August 23 at the Luz stadium in Lisbon (Portugal), two days after that of the Europa League (Cologne, Germany), and a week before that of the Women's Champions League (San Sebastian, Spain).
. New and spectacular format
The fan of the famous Cup with big ears will not only have his calendar to review, but all his habits. From the quarters, exit the confrontations in round-trip matches, exit the goals which count double away, exit the "remountadas" and place at the famous final tournament at 8 ("Final Eight" in the English style) and its cleaver matches on neutral ground.
After the last eighths that remain to be played this week, and in particular Juventus-Lyon on Friday, direction Lisbon for the last eight teams qualified in C1 (August 12-23), and Germany for their C3 counterparts (August 10-21) . The ladies will go to the Basque country, between Bilbao and San Sebastián (21-30 August). In a vacuum, and without supporters in the stadiums.
This offers a program never seen before, with almost every day of August a major meeting of the European elite, without stopping!
"Fascinating and rich in emotions" for the Parisian president Nasser Al-Khelaïfi, "not bad" for Zinédine Zidane, the coach of Real Madrid, this innovative format will upset the landscape.
"The form of the day will be decisive," noted Bayern Munich coach Hansi Flick recently, aware that the preparation of clubs will differ completely, between those whose championships have just ended (Italy), those who have finished for some time (Germany) and those who have never resumed (France).
. On a wire
This preparation will be crucial, as the August rhythm promises to be frantic. Between August 5 and 23, in the space of just 19 days, count the trifle of 26 matches on the program of the C1 men and the C3. And this, without counting the meetings of the preliminary rounds of the following edition, which start in parallel!
For Bayern Munich or Barcelona, for example, the route to the trophy will require successively shining on the 8th (8th return), 14th (quarter), 19 (half) and 23 August.
It will also be necessary to do with a very high thermometer, a major factor in summer. "We know the heat is going to be overwhelming from now on," Zidane warned a few weeks ago, in light of July when La Liga was approaching its final sprint.
Watch out for injuries, then. Especially since some stars are already in the infirmary, starting with Kylian Mbappé, uncertain for the 8th of PSG, his Bergamo opponent Josep Ilicic or his Bavarian compatriot Benjamin Pavard. And that all will then switch to a historically dense 2020-21 season, with from August 21 the resumption of the first major championship, the French Ligue 1, and next June the holding of Euro-2020 postponed by a year.
Attention, above all, to health risks. Because if the virus situation in Lisbon, an alarming time, seems to give hope for a secure tournament, the slightest gap, the slightest case of Covid-19 in a team, the slightest isolation will lead to an almost unmanageable chain reaction in the heart of such a calendar, especially as UEFA hammers it all-out that it has "no plan B".
© 2020 AFP