UEFA offer hope to Leeds United fans wanting to return to Elland Road this season

Next month’s Super Cup has been put forward to be used as a pilot event to allow spectators into stadiums, UEFA has announced.

The 2020-21 curtain raiser, where the winners of the Champions League and Europa League will meet, is set to take place in Budapest on September 24.

The governing body has said that Nations League matches earlier that month will be behind closed doors, but a reduced number of fans could be allowed into the Super Cup.

Leeds United's Premier League campaign is set to begin against Liverpool at Anfield on September 12 and will be played without a crowd.

Top flight clubs, though, remain hopeful that stadiums can be opened at a reduced capacity later this year and into early 2021.

UEFA said in a statement: “UEFA mentioned that it would be too early to already allow fans into the upcoming UEFA national team competitions matches to be played at the beginning of September and that test match(es) should take place to study precisely the impact of spectators on current medical protocols.

“UEFA suggested to use the UEFA Super Cup, which will be played on 24 September in Budapest, as a pilot match for which a reduced number of spectators could be allowed in.”

The Football Association remains hopeful of welcoming England fans back to Wembley for October’s international triple-header.

“One decision that UEFA confirmed is there won’t be any fans in stadia in September, from our point of view it is a shame that fans won’t be able to attend any matches in person but we do have great broadcast partners,” FA chief Mark Bullingham said.

“We hope that by our three home games in October that there will be some change to that and we would like to get some fans into Wembley then.

“To what level, we have obviously got to work out with both UEFA and the government – we are not talking about full stadia but we are talking about having some level of crowds back in October as our goal.”

England will host Wales in a friendly on October 8 before two more Nations League Group 2 fixtures against Belgium and Denmark.

“We’d love to get fans back in the stadia for all three matches in October,” added Bullingham.

“UEFA have made the decision not to have any back in September for any games. In October I think it will be a different set of circumstances to be discussed.

“We didn’t go to that level of detail on the call today, but I think there could well be a circumstance where you get different approaches from different countries.

“The pandemic is so hard to predict but there are radically different situations in the countries and you’ve got to adapt.”