Thomas Frank: Brentford boss wants Premier League and League Cup games called off

2 years ago 77

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Brentford boss Thomas Frank believes this weekend's Premier League games and the League Cup ties next week should be postponed because of Covid-19.

The Bees have 13 cases of the virus among players and staff.

They had their league game against Manchester United called off on Tuesday because of a Covid-19 outbreak at the Old Trafford club.

"The Covid cases are going through the roof at all Premier League clubs," said Frank.

"Everyone is dealing with it and everyone has a problem at this moment in time.

"To postpone this round [of Premier League games] and the Carabao Cup would give everyone a week at least to clean and do everything at the training ground so everything is fine and we break the chain at every club."

Burnley's home match against Watford on Wednesday was postponed two and a half hours before kick-off after a Covid-19 outbreak in the away team.

That followed Brighton's game at the weekend against Tottenham being called off because of a high number of cases in the Spurs camp and Brentford's game against Manchester United being postponed.

Brentford are at Southampton on Saturday before hosting Chelsea in the League Cup quarter-finals on Wednesday.

Frank was called during his news conference on Thursday and told that there had been four more cases at the club to take the tally to 13.

"We respect fully that we want to play. We want to carry on but this way we can have Boxing Day going no problem, 100% sure of that," said Frank. "We think that would be very sensible to do that.

"The club have been in regular contact with the Premier League over the last couple of days."

Frank also called for more transparency from clubs regarding the number of cases they are dealing with.

"Vaccine is a free choice, we are living in a free world. I will definitely recommend it and we have a lot of players double vaccinated," he said.

"We arranged for the booster in the training ground on Wednesday. My biggest recommendation would be that they should be vaccinated."

Frank added: "I think it's very simple. Every manager or head coach wants badly to win. If it's not transparent from the one who is making the rules then you do what you can to add it to your advantage.

"Some clubs are more open and transparent than others. The key message is it should be very transparent. It's 'X' players and 'X' staff."

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