It's Fulham instead of Villa.. | Page 3 | Vital Football

It's Fulham instead of Villa..

So if the Premier League had allowed Fulham to play Chelsea on Friday we would have been faced with 4 games in 8 days at some point. Three consecutive games with 2 days prep. Yes, we would have notice that it's coming but it doesn't really help.

Having said that I have next no experience of supply chain planning so I really can't comment on how the PL compare with industry. Is Covid a typical problem they would face in terms of complexity and variables?

Not necessarily. The only problem would be if Fulham and Spurs end up in the FA Cup Final. As soon as one of them drop out they will be in the same boat as other Prem clubs and re-optimisation is easy. You only need one other Prem side that either club hasn't played yet and the switch is possible. That can't work if the Prem are insistent on holding their existing fixtures. They would need to maintain legitimate rules like Spurs and Arsenal can't be at home on the same day and relax other rules like a team not being able to play 3 home games in a row. They'd find a way.

To the company that runs the model , ATOS, this replanning is table stakes if they're allowed to switch a few variables. Instead though, they forced to lock most of it and then the unnatural acts happen by squashing fixtures in. Just look at what happens when Spurs get to a CL quarter / semi final. No single adjustment made and we end up playing Sunday / Tuesday. Ajax get the weekend off.
 
This really could be a big factor in the outcome of our season. Whilst I feel that Villa's current league position is false, they have been playing well of late, and I had Wednesday's game down as a nailed on draw. Fulham in comparison, we should beat as comfortably as we choose to. An extra two points at this stage, with the current logjam at the top, will be huge. Furthermore, by the time we get to play Villa their bubble may well have burst, whereby the likelihood of picking up the full three points will be much improved at a critical stage of the season.
Well, it seemed like a good theory at the time!