‘I can’t understand how people can’t be here’: Ian Wright and Roy Keane insists ‘clubs will go bust’ if the Government don’t start allowing fans back to top-level football
- England beat Wales in front of an empty Wembley Stadium on Thursday night
- The Government is continuing to ban fans from attending sporting matches
- Ian Wright can’t understand why the public can go to cinemas and not to games
- Roy Keane believed 10,000 people could have attended Thursday’s fixture
Ian Wright and Roy Keane vented their frustration at the Government for not allowing football supporters back into grounds and predict that lower league clubs will go bust.
England played their first home game since the coronavirus hiatus in front of an empty Wembley Stadium against Wales, with the majority of football teams in the country still not allowed to accept fans due to the global pandemic.
And ITV pundit Wright could not believe how members of the public can visit the Royal Albert Hall or even watch a football match in an enclosed cinema but not attend a match in an open-air stadium.
Roy Keane (left) and Ian Wright (right) cannot believe why fans cannot go to football matches
England beat Wales 3-0 in front of an empty 90,000-seater Wembley Stadium on Thursday
The former Arsenal and England striker told ITV on Thursday: ‘Yeah I’m very frustrated when you see the size of Wembley and how they can social distance in it.
‘People will be worried about the concourses but when you look the measures they are doing (to get us in the ground) – and you’ll have to up that – I can’t understand how people can’t be here.
‘When you look at the Albert Hall and cinemas and seeing how they close the curtains (in cinemas when people watch games in there) – why can’t we get fans back in now? Look at the lower league teams, they are suffering.’
Fellow ITV pundit Keane predicted that smaller professional clubs will suffer due to the continuation of behind closed doors matches and even thought that 10,000 fans could have attended the England match on Thursday evening.
Keane believes 10,000 fans could have attended the England match at Wembley on Thursday
Fans are currently allowed to watch matches in a cinema (left) but not in a stadium (right)
The Irishman added: ‘Clubs will go bust, if you look at the situation tonight – you can’t tell me there can’t be 10,000 people in there tonight.
‘It’s frustrating and bizarre at the moment.’
The Government had planned to welcome fans back into sporting events for the start of October due to the success of several test events in August and September.
However, a spike in cases leading to new lockdown regulations such as the ‘Rule of Six’ and the closure of pubs at 10pm meant plans to return fans to stadia had to be delayed.
The last Premier League match to accept fans into grounds was Leicester City’s win over Aston Villa on March 9.