[spireitematt]

Will the season finish again? With Covid cases and infection rate still pretty high and with games in the National League being postponed or called off quite regular surely the season is in doubt again. Majority of football below National League North/South has been declared void for the rest of the season as in those leagues they've played up to 6-8 games and therefore wouldn't be able to complete the season in time for the 2021/22 season.

The Premier League will go ahead and more than likely finish like it did last season as will the Champions League and domestic cups.

In the League Of Ireland instead of playing each other 4 times they only played each other once and the season was finished before December.

[Devongone]

I think we will probably finish the season in the National League just because of our classification as elite football, but to do it somebody has to come up with better Covid provisions for the teams involved ....... and organise a finish in mid June, possibly ditching play offs and even the FA Trophy.

If I were James Rowe I would go straight in for Kane Drummond from Warrington Rylands now. Professional training and maybe some sub bench appearances and I guarantee you a star player for next season. Why wait, why not take advantage of the Covid situation? .If there are any players he fancies lower down the pyramid this is the time. From Whitehawk to Whitley Bay there are good players whose seasons look to be ending now who would be delighted to negotiate the end of one contract the start of another.

I can't understand why vaccination has to be such a professionalised process. Patients are sent out of hospital all the time having been taught either to self-inject or to cast a spouse in that role. My flu jab was given by a pharmacist. St John's Ambulance people could give injections, retired doctors, nurses .......... tranqued up drug addicts manage the whole process efficiently most of the time ....... so how long would it take the armed forces to learn how to do it, after all they learn how to shoot people quick enough - shooting them up isn't that different is it? One doctor on hand in case of allergic reactions etc ............ stop riding your effing bike round the Olympic Park and just get people mobilised Boris. How long do you think it would take you to learn how vaccinate people safely? We'll get through everybody by the end of autumn, how shit a promise is that? If we'd have approached Dunkirk like this only the channel swimmers would have made it home. We have NHS executives in huge offices inventing pointless paperwork for which they are paid a king's ransom. Learn how to inject people, speed up the supply chain, get effing jabbin'!

In the time it takes Sage to invent a new form of social distancing those people have the skills to have injected hundreds if not thousands of people. Stop talking start doing.

I'd be quite happy for a Vet to vaccinate me. He'd have needed at least three As at A Level to get on the course and it is even more competitive than Medicine.

[Dancingwilldoit]

Vets can do it Dev. Problem is they are only paying minimum wage. My youngest's girfriend qualified as a dentist last year and has been doing it for a couple of weeks now. Dont think theres a shortage of people to do it its more down to supply of the vaccine. On the radio this morning our local MP was complaining that the only local vaccination point in NE Derbs was at Chesterfield Royal but its only working on a Wednesday ????? Good job he's a Tory eh.

[spireitematt]

I think we will probably finish the season in the National League just because of our classification as elite football, but to do it somebody has to come up with better Covid provisions for the teams involved ....... and organise a finish in mid June, possibly ditching play offs and even the FA Trophy.

If I were James Rowe I would go straight in for Kane Drummond from Warrington Rylands now. Professional training and maybe some sub bench appearances and I guarantee you a star player for next season. Why wait, why not take advantage of the Covid situation? .If there are any players he fancies lower down the pyramid this is the time. From Whitehawk to Whitley Bay there are good players whose seasons look to be ending now who would be delighted to negotiate the end of one contract the start of another.

I can't understand why vaccination has to be such a professionalised process. Patients are sent out of hospital all the time having been taught either to self-inject or to cast a spouse in that role. My flu jab was given by a pharmacist. St John's Ambulance people could give injections, retired doctors, nurses .......... tranqued up drug addicts manage the whole process efficiently most of the time ....... so how long would it take the armed forces to learn how to do it, after all they learn how to shoot people quick enough - shooting them up isn't that different is it? One doctor on hand in case of allergic reactions etc ............ stop riding your effing bike round the Olympic Park and just get people mobilised Boris. How long do you think it would take you to learn how vaccinate people safely? We'll get through everybody by the end of autumn, how shit a promise is that? If we'd have approached Dunkirk only the channel swimmers would have made it home. We have NHS executives in huge offices inventing pointless paperwork for which they are paid a king's ransom. Learn how to inject people, speed up the supply chain, get effing jabbin'!

In the time it takes Sage to invent a new form of social distancing those people have the skills to have injected hundreds if not thousands of people. Stop talking start doing.

I'd be quite happy for a Vet to vaccinate me. He'd have needed at least three As at A Level to get on the course and it is even more competitive than Medicine.

If the season continues till the end then there is no reason why we couldn't try and aim for a promotion push, we are only 4 pts from making the playoffs with a few games in hand and Rowe is building a team by bringing in new players to make the team even better. This division is so open and the only team who is really out in front is Torquay.

If there is enough supply, you could have 24/7 vaccine hubs where you turn up in your car and have the jab in your arm through the window and then park up for 15 minutes and then drive off.

[Devongone]

The vaccine companies are talking delivering 2million a week as a base rate and escalating from there. The NHS is a problem in that it is preventing retired doctors coming back to give vaccinations unless they undertake training and complete lots of forms.

All this said about our massive shortcomings it goes to show what a bunch of shit the EEC is that we have vaccinated more than the whole of Europe and that we have ordered vaccines which have become reality whereas they have hundreds of thousands ordered from French and German sources which may not be ready, even if they succeed, until the end of this year! Big bureaucracies are the the last thing you need in an emergency.

Yes yes there is no reason we should not have drive through jabs. In a small town of 10,000 people like Totnes with two main doctors' surgeries it surely would not take long to set up centres in our civic hall and local village halls, let our very good GPs organise it, get them the vaccine and the whole town could be done in a week. And if we were doing it Dartmouth, Kingsbridge, Ivybridge could all be doing it too and a whole country could follow the model.

I just don't think you can say something is a national emergency and then suggest you'll have it sorted this year sometime.

Truth is they are just loving all the attention. Nothing better than interrupting The Bidding Room to provide an hour and a half of Boris, the alien Whitty and that poseur Huw Edwards. Give me Nigel Havers and a collection of Victorian powder compacts any day!

[Dancingwilldoit]

Wow Dev, you still have a dig at the EU even though our infection and death rates far exceed anything they have had - anywhere. We certainly need the vaccines more than they do given the good old "British" or should I say "English" Government pandemic handling.
Boris or Angela for leader? Mmmm let me see now.........

[St Charles Owl]

Wow Dev, you still have a dig at the EU even though our infection and death rates far exceed anything they have had - anywhere. We certainly need the vaccines more than they do given the good old "British" or should I say "English" Government pandemic handling.
Boris or Angela for leader? Mmmm let me see now.........

The UK doesn't far exceed the rest of the EU!! Belgium, Slovenia, Switzerland, Croatia, Netherlands, Sweden and Portugal all have a higher overall infection rate, and the UK is essentially at the same level as Spain, France and Austria. In terms of deaths Belgium, Slovenia, Bosnia, Italy and Liechtenstein are higher per million population and the UK is running at a similar level to Hungary, Croatia, France and Spain. Germany is the one anomaly during this whole pandemic but having an actual scientist as the head of Government and their renowned efficiency I am sure accounts for this.

These comparisons may well still change with this new strain the UK is seeing at the moment but so far the UK isn't alone in struggling with this. The fact that the UK has a vaccination rate currently 15 times higher than France and even 5 times higher than Germany will hopefully allow the UK to get a little further towards eradicating this quicker.

[Dancingwilldoit]

Our death rate is just crazy atm and is currently the worst in Europe anywhere. We are nearly at half the US rate and look at the population difference there.
Yesterday they were saying the new strain is only 30% more contagious than the old strain so it seems to me that it's just a convenience to blame it for the catastrophic increase in the death rate instead of being honest. Our world beating £20 Billion test and trace has disappeared down a big black hole with the money and Dildo Harding I think, has been whisked away by aliens.
We are an Island the same as New Zealand and Australia and look at the comparisons there. We should have closed the borders ages ago and introduced testing at the border in March last year not January this. Our governments handling has been shambolic and they have gotten away with it because of Brexit obscuring reality.

[Devongone]

The EU death rates are a little better than ours because the countries acted individually.

It should have been a wise move to use their MASSIVE buying power to come together to buy vaccine, but their decision making was so slow and bureaucratic they turned our decision not to be part of the process into a wise one.

Huge bureaucracies can't and won't act fast. They always preserve the bureaucracy itself. So far individually Germany has been massively more successful than us, France, Italy and Spain fairly similarly crap, Belgium too. Once they came together to buy they took so long they went to the back of the queue and bought the wrong stuff. It's just fact.

Command economies have managed to do lockdowns well, why, because they haven't had to go through several layers to make a decision. It's shut down or go for re-education, stay home in case of burly men with a prison van.

To see what I say is true, look at where innovation comes from. Is it within old fashioned companies with a pyramid power structure in which any idea goes through layers of management, or is it in a flatter structure of the empowered young, trying out ideas, getting quick okays and nays? The EU is just well-meaning and out of date. It isn't fit for purpose and its stated aim is to become less so. The fairer it becomes the slower it will go. That's all.

We ourselves are worrying about all kinds of irrelevancies when planning to vaccinate people and protect our population from the virus, so imagine how many problems 27 countries with competing interests can produce. Germany is already beginning to act alone. The others have to follow. I'd sooner have most of their governments than ours ........ if they didn't feel compelled to act as if they couldn't see the wood for the trees.

In a world of smartphones choosing a form of government that makes pigeon post decisions isn't ever going to work. We are led by idiots in a system designed for the nineteenth century and the EU is managing to fall behind us, just because we have some very smart scientists who have made some wise vaccine suggestions. It's no good having huge buying power if you wait till everyone else has been shopping.

[spireitematt]

It looks like the National League and North and South season might end. The DCMS has indicated to the National League that their £11m (other sources say it's £14m) of funding will be in loans. Grants are only available in exceptional circumstances. Clubs are concerned about the funding situation & reluctant to take on loans. Some apparently would prefer to furlough players & staff rather than continue playing the season. There's a meeting on Wednesday to discuss the situation.