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Wanderers will begin life in League Two in seven weeks.
The EFL yesterday confirmed that the new campaign will start on the weekend of September 12.
The Premier League, which concludes tomorrow, will also start at the same time after a meeting of top-flight clubs.
The regular season in the Football League will conclude on May 8 and 9, the league said, with the play-offs to follow at the end of the month.
The news means that the first three weeks of the campaign look set to be played behind closed doors, with the Government trialling events including a county cricket friendly between Surrey and Middlesex and the World Snooker Championship ahead of letting spectators back into stadiums from October 1.
That would be in reduced numbers in order to observe social distancing, reports yesterday suggesting that grounds would be a maximum of 33 per cent full according to guidelines issued by the Sports Grounds Safety Authority.
That figure could be as low as 17 per cent depending on which space-per-person calculation method is used, something which will concern clubs in the lower leagues who voted to end the 2019/20 campaign due to the costs associated with playing games without fans in stadiums.
Crowd dynamics consultancy Movement Strategies has been commissioned by the SGSA to evaluate the return of spectators to venues.
Executive director Simon Ancliffe told the PA news agency: “People are focused on safety. Everybody wants it to be safe, commercially successful and a good experience, probably in that order.
“There’s a difference between a new stadium and an old, historic one, and that might not be because of the viewing capacity, it might be because of the outside concourse, the inside concourse.
“Everyone would like to get back to one place (full stadiums) but with social distancing it just isn’t going to be possible. I don’t want to give a number (on what a maximum percentage of capacity might be) yet, post-test events that will become much more clear.”
The University of Bolton Stadium has been seen as a good fit for the restrictions that will be in place and was put forward as a potential host for Premier League games if neutral venues were needed as part of Project Restart.
When Wanderers to return to competitive action, it will be a little more than six months since their last meaningful outing, a 2-2 League One draw at Burton Albion on March 10.
The September 12 date has come as no surprise to most with head coach Ian Evatt having brought his players back on Monday with a view to having an eight-week pre-season to implement his new style of play.
Source
The EFL yesterday confirmed that the new campaign will start on the weekend of September 12.
The Premier League, which concludes tomorrow, will also start at the same time after a meeting of top-flight clubs.
The regular season in the Football League will conclude on May 8 and 9, the league said, with the play-offs to follow at the end of the month.
The news means that the first three weeks of the campaign look set to be played behind closed doors, with the Government trialling events including a county cricket friendly between Surrey and Middlesex and the World Snooker Championship ahead of letting spectators back into stadiums from October 1.
That would be in reduced numbers in order to observe social distancing, reports yesterday suggesting that grounds would be a maximum of 33 per cent full according to guidelines issued by the Sports Grounds Safety Authority.
That figure could be as low as 17 per cent depending on which space-per-person calculation method is used, something which will concern clubs in the lower leagues who voted to end the 2019/20 campaign due to the costs associated with playing games without fans in stadiums.
Crowd dynamics consultancy Movement Strategies has been commissioned by the SGSA to evaluate the return of spectators to venues.
Executive director Simon Ancliffe told the PA news agency: “People are focused on safety. Everybody wants it to be safe, commercially successful and a good experience, probably in that order.
“There’s a difference between a new stadium and an old, historic one, and that might not be because of the viewing capacity, it might be because of the outside concourse, the inside concourse.
“Everyone would like to get back to one place (full stadiums) but with social distancing it just isn’t going to be possible. I don’t want to give a number (on what a maximum percentage of capacity might be) yet, post-test events that will become much more clear.”
The University of Bolton Stadium has been seen as a good fit for the restrictions that will be in place and was put forward as a potential host for Premier League games if neutral venues were needed as part of Project Restart.
When Wanderers to return to competitive action, it will be a little more than six months since their last meaningful outing, a 2-2 League One draw at Burton Albion on March 10.
The September 12 date has come as no surprise to most with head coach Ian Evatt having brought his players back on Monday with a view to having an eight-week pre-season to implement his new style of play.
Source