Arsenal have confirmed that the Europa League clash with PSV Eindhoven at Emirates Stadium will now be played at 6pm on 20 October.
The match was originally due to take place tomorrow but has been postponed because the police are focusing their resources on marshalling the crowds assembling in the capital to pay tribute to the late Queen Elizabeth II.
The Gunners’ Premier League match with Manchester City, originally scheduled for 19 October, has been sacrificed to ensure we’re able to fulfil our European commitments.
Clearly a 6pm start time isn’t ideal but we’re guessing it’s been selected so the match doesn’t clash with two Premier League matches that are being broadcast by Amazon Prime Video.
A date for the visit of Pep Guardiola’s reigning champions is yet to be agreed but it’s looking like it will have to take place after the World Cup. The same goes for the clash with Everton which should have happened last Sunday.
At least we aren’t having to forfeit it, and it eases the burden a bit in October (we had to play Sp*rs, Liverpool and City within 4 matches). Though makes post World Cup more congested, so let’s hope we can cope and don’t have injuries to any key plaeyers (eg TP…).
Yeah that was a nasty looking run of fixtures, definitely one of the times we will benefit from rescheduling. Let’s hope it’s put at a nice time post world cup where we are relatively injury free. (Never fully, although a gunner can dream)
Damn…..i was looking forward to playing PSV, Everton and Man City in 45 minutes matches, all played one after the other in the same afternoon, solves the match pile up problem in one sweep.
Nonsense I hear you say?…wait til those behind the Superleague and All Star games hear about my genius idea.
I’m looking forward to the Premier League Royal Rumble, where all 20 teams are on the pitch at the same time.
Brilliant!
They used to do 1-evening preseason tournaments like that in Italy. Two teams would play 45 minutes, then one team would completely change its players and play a different team for 45 minutes, then that team would change all their players and play the first team to have played.
They did (still do?) in Spain as well and I could swear i’ve seen them in the UK too but it could be my memory playing tricks on me.
As summer tournaments go, they are good entertainment.
I wonder if we’ll end up playing Sp*rs, Man City and Man Utd within a week in January…
January 17th/18th is reserved for FA Cup 3rd Round replays. So they could use this date in the calendar if neither team needs to replay, but it means arranging the fixture at only 10 days notice.
Suspect the FA will end up scrapping 3rd and 4th round replays again this year. There’s a whole round of fixtures (Premier League all the way down to non-league) that needs playing, would make sense to free up one of those mid-weeks for those 50+ games than stick to keeping it free for potentially something like half a dozen replays
My guess is there will be reinforcements coming in Jan so it might do us a favor.
Perhaps schedule Man City home and away in the same week. Then just quietly agree to share the points.
Two each, or three each?
Best outcome, glad it’s sorted quickly
Not so bad to avoid City in that October run too
I can see it now. It’ll be a title decider between us and City at the end of the season. Exciting.
(One can dream..)
Sounds like a result tbh 👍
Least worst outcome for the club.
Yes, but it was always – by far – the most likely outcome.
There was never any real chance we’d forfeit the tie – as some on this site were suggesting – and calm, behind-the-scenes, negotiations have succeeded.
Although forfeiting the tie would of saved us a game and let’s be honest, we’d still most probably finish top of the group.
Not really. If we “lost” at home to PSV and didn’t win away, there’s a strong chance we’d finish 2nd behind them.
As a club forfeiting a game is a criminal offence.
“… doesn’t clash with two Premier League matches that are being broadcast by Amazon Prime Video.”
Er, what have PL matches on Amazon have to do with us playing PSV in Europe? Are Amazon worried that their audience might all bugger off to the Emirates to watch us? If so, what the fuck are they smoking ‘cos I really want some of that mind-altering shit?
If they scheduled our match at the same time, Amazon could probably sue them.
Also yes, there are non Arsenal fans who would still rather watch us, than some other teams I could mention.
And if you have some mind altering shit I’d like some, please.
I don’t think the issue is with Amazon.
It’s a UEFA rule, they don’t want Champions League or Europa League matches clashing with Premier League matches.
Something to do with not wanting to audience share, less eyes on advertisements.
Aha, that makes sense. I’d failed to consider UEFA’s legendary greed as the driving force here.
But for the financial and sponsor complexities involved, how interesting would it be if we forfeited the match yet still topped the group.
Possibly, but it’s that word again, “if”. We’ll never know now, will we.
So, despite the panic in some quarters here that we’d forfeit the tie, which was always highly unlikely, everything has been re-arranged. Let’s just move on to the Brentford game on Sunday.
Weird we can’t play on Thursday but can on Sunday, closer to the Bank Holiday…
Presumably the issue is with the amount of PSV fans coming over, not the date.
3,000 got tickets, but that’s not to mention how many would come over without a ticket. They would all be congregating and drinking all day in the city so it really would stretch police resources the whole day.
I guess, though most of them will have to cancel their flights…
It was hardly a large proportion of people, to be fair.
I think the police or their bosses were plain simple scared of imaginary situations. Cancelling a fixture should be a difficult process considering how difficult it is for a lot fans to arrange the logistics. Unless for a natural calamity a match should never be postponed.
Hopefully we’ll have top of the group all wrapped up before this game
I doubt that is mathematically possible.
Even if we beat Bodo/Glimt twice in our next two fixtures, this rearranged PSV home game is now our matchday 4, so there will still be three games left going into that game.
Really missed those 5.45 and 6pm europa league kick offs 😂🙄
Let’s hope these pesky rearranged Premier League matches don’t put in jeopardy the money-spinning All-Star Game with half-time entertainment from baton-twirling cheerleaders we all desperately want to see.
Common sense solution. Makes me wonder why the scumbags over a white shite lane couldn’t come up with such a simple solution last season.
Take a shot of TEQUILA every time you read the word clash!
That image would be a great Where’s Wally (Waldo??) pic