Paris Saint Germaine (PSG) have been handed the Ligue 1 championship for the third year in a row with a clear 12 point lead over second place Marseille, despite not having played a full season due to the coronavirus health crisis.

The decision was taken by the Ligue de Football Professionnel (LFP) after the French Prime Minister, Edouard Philippe, announced on Tuesday that no sports events would be possible under de-escalation measures until at least September.

This dashed the hopes of the LFP, who had hoped to restart play in June to finish out the season. Few were in doubt that PSG would hold onto the top spot, but for others whose futures were not so certain, the decision has been met with mixed feelings depending on where a team sat. 

AS Monaco has ended the season in 9^th, a situation that the club’s Vice President Oleg Petrov wanted “to avoid”.

“We regret this ranking because we had the ambition to do better,” he said in a press statement. “During this season, we have made a lot of efforts – reorganisation, reinforcements during the transfer window – in order to change things and reach European standings.” Robert Moreno replacing Leonardo Jardim is one of the changes the club was hoping to capitalise on.

“It didn’t quite work out the way we wanted it to. It is now time to analyse everything that has happened before we project ourselves with determination towards next season,” said Mr Petrov. 

The LFP says that even if there are appeals, they will not be considered. As far as they are concerned, the 2019-20 season is a bad memory and they are already looking ahead to the 2020-21 season to start at the end of August.

General Director of the LFP, Didier Quillot, did say they would play the finals of the Coupe de France and the Coupe de la Ligue in early August, if given permission by UEFA, which would impact qualification for the Europa League.
“If the finals of the Coupe de la Ligue and Coupe de France take place, the places in the Europa League will be allocated to their winner, if the winner is not PSG. The rule does not change,” he said. 
Lille, Reims and Nice seemed poised to have places in the Europa League through their league standings, however that is now subject to change.