Financially-hit Irish sporting bodies are facing further hardship following the announcement of Christmas Covid restrictions.
Concerned with the transmissible figures for the new Omicron variant of Covid-19, the Government has agreed that outdoor sporting events are to be limited to 50% capacity, with a cap of 5,000 spectators.
The new regulations will kick in from Monday, so in the short term Munster’s Champions Cup clash with Castres at Thomond Park on Saturday night is not affected by the changes.
However the festive United Rugby Championship interpros will be hit, including Munster’s home tie with Leinster on St Stephen’s Day and Connacht’s home tie with Munster on New Year’s Day, while Leinster are scheduled to play the Lions at the RDS on January 7.
There are also Christmas race meetings taking place at Leopardstown and Limerick. The restrictions are to set to continue to January 30.
In terms of the reduction from over 25,000 to 5,000 for the Munster v Leinster game, former Munster Rugby star Barry Murphy told RTÉ: “I don’t know how they’re going to manage that.
“Obviously it’s one of the biggest sporting events of the rugby calendar, a packed Thomond Park over Christmas is always an incredible day out and we haven’t seen live audiences there for it in two years.
“I don’t know how they’re meant to turn around to 20,000 people and say, ‘you can’t go’, there are a lot of people who have planned their Christmas break around that.
“For it to happen a week out is really tough and Munster in particular will be very frustrated with that announcement.”
Taoiseach Michéal Martin said: “We are still in the early days, we are going to see a massive rise in infections, far in excess of anything we have seen to date.
“The challenge we face is how to slow the rise of infections.
“We are in a much, much stronger place than we were but there is no silver bullet to fix it.
“The news this evening will be desperately disappointing to many…however the truth is that we are in a much better place than we were this time, we just need to get to the other side of this Omicron strain as quickly as possible.”
Christmas Covid: Outdoor sporting events limited to 50% capacity, with a cap of 5,000 spectators
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