Peter Crouch has questioned why the Premier League postponed their matches following the sad passing of Queen Elizabeth II and admitted it may have "better" if teams and supporters were able to pay their respects in the stadiums.
On Friday afternoon, the Premier League and the FA decided that all of this weekend's fixtures would be postponed as a mark of respect for The Queen, who sadly passed away on Thursday at the age of 96.
In a statement released on Friday, Premier League chief executive Richard Masters said: "We and our clubs would like to pay tribute to Her Majesty’s long and unwavering service to our country. As our longest-serving monarch, she has been an inspiration and leaves behind an incredible legacy following a life of dedication.
"This is a tremendously sad time for not just the nation but also for the millions of people around the world who admired her, and we join together with all those in mourning her passing."
Despite football's decision to shut down as the country enters a period of mourning, other sports, including rugby and cricket, have decided to play on this weekend. And England's cricket team was lauded for the moving tribute they paid to The Queen ahead of Saturday's Test Match against South Africa at The Oval.
Players came out of the dressing rooms to a military guard of honour before undertaking two minutes' silence. Both teams then sang their respective national anthems, which included a rousing rendition of 'God Save The King' from the home crowd. Players from both sides will wear black armbands for the remaining three days of the Test match.
Leicester Tigers and Exeter Chiefs also paid tribute to the Queen's death with a minutes' silence on the opening weekend of the Rugby Premiership. And Crouch believes football should have followed a similar pattern.
He told Twitter : "I know it’s only a game and some things are much bigger but imagine all our games went ahead this weekend. Black armbands, silences observed, national anthem, Royal band playing etc to the millions around the world watching? Isn’t that a better send off?"
The comment made it's mark on Twitter, ranking up a whopping 209.1k likes and 23.1k retweets. To put that into context, Crouch's last tweet only clocked up 356 likes.
Meanwhile Gary Lineker also shared the same view. He tweeted: "Given the wonderful and moving scenes at The Oval, it feels a real shame that football is not taking place this weekend, therefore missing the opportunity to pay its respects."
The DCMS had confirmed earlier on Friday that individual sports were free to use their own discretion when deciding whether or not they should proceed with events that were scheduled to take place across the weekend.
