The North London derby clash between Tottenham Hotspur and Arsenal has been postponed.

Arsenal submitted a request to have Sunday’s game called off, claiming they had “many players currently unavailable across our squad as a result of Covid, injuries and players away with their countries at AFCON”.

According to Sky Sports, the postponement has left Tottenham’s hierarchy angry as they don’t believe there is an outbreak of coronavirus at the Emirates.

NLD postponed

But the Premier League accepted Arsenal’s request and the game will be played at a later date.

“Following a request from Arsenal, the Premier League board met today and regrettably agreed to postpone the club's away fixture against Tottenham,” a statement from the league said.

"With Arsenal having fewer than the required number of players available for the match (13 outfield players and one goalkeeper), the board accepted the club's application.

“The decision is a result of a combination of COVID-19, existing and recent injuries and players on international duty at the Africa Cup of Nations."

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Neville tweets after NLD postponed

Spurs aren’t the only ones left upset by the decision.

Gary Neville said on Friday Night Football that Arsenal’s request should be ignored.

“Folarin Balogun and Ainsley Maitland-Niles have gone on loan, Granit Xhaka's got a red card - that's not the fault of anybody else. We can't be calling fixtures off,” he said.

And in the wake of the game officially being called off, the former Manchester United right-back said the league can’t continue to let clubs ask to postpone matches.

“Game off. What started out as postponements due to a pandemic has now become about clubs not having their best team,” Neville wrote on Twitter.

“The Premier League must stop this now, draw a line in the sand and say all games go ahead unless you have an exceptional amount of CV cases. It’s wrong.”

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Neville’s tweet quickly went viral, amassing more than 4,000 retweets and 29,000 ‘likes’ within half an hour of being sent.

It's clear that the Premier League haven't got a tight a grip on the situation as they should have. 

There is an unnerving feeling that clubs are using the possibility of getting matches postponed in order to cope with absences due to injuries and AFCON.

Whether that's true or not, it's a matter that the league can quickly resolve by ordering for all matches to be played.

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