Arsenal, Chelsea and Tottenham could be impacted by an important rule change made to combat fixture congestion this season.
More Premier League matches, including Chelsea vs Liverpool, were cancelled for the upcoming weekend (September 17 and 18) due to police shortages expected with high volumes of people travelling to London for the Queen's funeral and to pay respects to Britain's longest-serving monarch.
With all of last weekend's matches also to be rescheduled, as well as Arsenal's Europa League match against PSV Eindhoven, any more cancellations would cause havoc on a schedule which is already convoluted due to the winter World Cup in Qatar stretching the season.
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There are now discussions being had, according to MailSport, to scrap FA Cup third and fourth round replays in a bid to free up some room in the footballing calendar. With no free time until the weekend of January 17 for Premier League matches from last weekend to be rescheduled, let alone the three matches from the upcoming weekend also to be fitted in, FA Cup replays are seen as an expendable part of the calendar.
Having already scrapped replays in the past two seasons due to fixture congestion and Covid-19, there is a demand for them to be ditched again this season. The current date for the third round is the weekend of January 7, with replays often played in the midweek following the match. This would clash with the Carabao Cup quarter-finals for teams playing in that competition though, but would nevertheless be a possible place for matches to be played should replays be scrapped and teams not be involved in the League Cup at that stage.
As for the fourth round, which is scheduled for the weekend of January 28, there is a free midweek immediately following that weekend, but teams in the Carabao Cup semi-final would have a clash if they were to try and fit in replayed Premier League games there.
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