United Kingdom Prime Minister, Boris Johnson has said that government will review the plans for spectators to attend sporting events in England from 1 October.
Johnson, speaking at a Downing Street news conference, also said pilot events in September would be restricted to 1,000 fans with social distancing measures in place.
“We must revise plans to pilot larger audiences in venues later this month and review our intention to return audiences to stadiums from 1 October,” said Johnson.
“But that doesn’t mean we are going to scrap the programme entirely. e are just going to have to review it and abridge it.”
Culture Secretary Oliver Dowden said: “In light of increasing transmission rates, the government is reviewing the proposed sports and business events pilots ahead of 1 October and we will unfortunately need to scale some back.
“We know fans and audiences are eager to return, and jobs depend on this too, so work continues around the clock on the ‘moonshot project’ with the ambition of having audiences back much closer to normal by Christmas, if safe to do so.”
The majority of sports in England have been played behind closed doors since the coronavirus lockdown in March, including Premier League football, the FA Cup final, England Test matches and two Formula 1 races at Silverstone. (BBC)