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All eyes on Germany as Bundesliga football returns

The Bundesliga returns to action on Saturday with the resumption of the first top European league since the coronavirus lockdown. It will be watched closely to see if it provides a blueprint for other competitions.

Published: 16 May 2020 14:25 CEST
All eyes on Germany as Bundesliga football returns
Referee Deniz Aytekin (C) wears a face mask as he walks on the pitch before the German first division Bundesliga football match BVB Borussia Dortmund v Schalke 04 on May 16, 2020: Martin Meissner/AFP

Matches will be played behind closed doors and players and coaches, who have been in quarantine for the past week, must follow stringent hygiene guidelines.

In the highlight of six matches on Saturday, Borussia Dortmund host Schalke 04 in the Ruhr Derby at 1330 GMT, a fixture that would normally attract an 82,000 crowd to Signal Iduna Park.

Professional football returned to western Europe earlier in the day as the second-tier Bundesliga 2 resumed with four matches at 1100 GMT.

South Korean Lee Jae-Sung scored the first league goal in over two months when he gave Holstein Kiel a third-minute lead at Regensburg.

Although Germany has suffered far fewer deaths from coronavirus than other large European countries, it is still too dangerous for crowds to return.

On Sunday, Bayern Munich will resume their quest for an eighth successive Bundesliga title when they play in the capital against Union Berlin.

Bayern were four points clear at the top of the table when the season was suspended in March. An exciting Dortmund team featuring Norwegian striker Erling Braut Haaland and highly-rated English forward Jadon Sancho are in second place.

Mass testing

The German Football League (DFL) made no secret of the fact that several clubs are already in a dire financial situation as a result of the lockdown.

If they are able to complete the nine remaining rounds of matches by June 30, clubs could receive around 300 million euros ($324 million) in money from television contracts.

In order to get the political green light to resume, the DFL has put in place the mass testing of players and staff.

The bus transferring Borussia Dortmund football's team arrives before the German first division Bundesliga football match BVB Borussia Dortmund v Schalke 04 at the Signal Iduna Park on May 16, 2020 in Dortmund, western Germany as the season resumed following a two-month absence due to the novel coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic.
INA FASSBENDER / AFP

The matches themselves will be surrounded by extraordinary measures. Teams will arrive at stadiums in several buses in order to meet social distancing requirements inside the vehicles.

Once play begins, players have been warned not to shake hands or embrace to celebrate goals, while substitutes and coaches on the bench must wear protective masks.

There are also concerns that fans will try to approach stadiums to support their teams from afar. Police in Dortmund have appealed to fans to stay at home.

Clubs in England, Spain and Italy, where leagues are weeks away from returning to action, will be watching to see how the weekend's games go.s

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COVID-19

Is the pandemic over in Germany?

As much of Germany lifts - or prepares to lift - the last remaining Covid-19 measures, intensive care units say Covid-19 admissions are no longer straining the system.

Published: 24 January 2023 09:00 CET
Is the pandemic over in Germany?

Despite a difficult winter of respiratory illnesses, intensive care units in Germany say Covid-19 admissions have almost halved. The number of cases having to be treated in the ICU has gone down to 800 from 1,500 at the beginning of this month.

“Corona is no longer a problem in intensive care units,” Gernot Marx, Vice President of the German Interdisciplinary Association for Intensive Care and Emergency Medicine, told the German Editorial Network. “A the moment, we don’t have to think every day about how to still ensure the care of patients, but how to actually run a service that can help.”

Marx said the drop has allowed them to catch up on many postponed surgeries.

The number of sick employees in hospitals is also falling, helping to relieve the pressure on personnel.

The easing pressure on hospitals correlates with the assessment of prominent virologist and head of the Virology department at Berlin’s Charite – Christian Drosten – who said in December that the pandemic was close to ending, with the winter wave being an endemic one.

German federal and state governments are now in the midst of lifting the last of the country’s pandemic-related restrictions. Free Covid-19 antigen tests for most people, with exceptions for medical personnel, recently ended.

READ ALSO: Free Covid-19 tests end in Germany

Six federal states – Bavaria, Baden-Württemberg, Hessen, Thuringia, Lower Saxony, and Schleswig-Holstein – have ended mandatory isolation periods for people who test positive for Covid-19.

Bavaria, Saxony-Anhalt, and Schleswig-Holstein have ended the requirement to wear FFP2 masks on public transport, while Berlin, Brandenburg, Saxony, Thuringia, and Mecklenburg-West Pomerania will follow suit on February 2nd.

At that time, the federal government will also drop its requirement for masks to be worn on long-distance trains. Labour Minister Hubertus Heil says that’s when he also intends to exempt workplaces – apart from medical locations – from a mask requirement.

READ ALSO: Germany to drop mask mandate in trains and buses from February 2nd

Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg will also end the requirement for patients to wear a mask in doctor’s offices. That’s a requirement that, so far, will stay in place everywhere else. Federal Health Minister Karl Lauterbach has also said that he thinks this requirement should remain. 

But some public health insurers and general practitioners are calling for a nationwide end to the obligation for wearing masks in doctor’s offices.

“The pandemic situation is over,” National Association of Statutory Health Physicians (KBV) Chair Andreas Gassen told the RND network. “High-risk patients aren’t treated in all practices. It should generally be left up to medical colleagues to decide whether they want to require masks in their practices.”

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