By Soccernet staff
<!-- end story header --> <!-- begin left column -->
<!-- begin page tools -->
January 8, 2010
<!-- end page tools --> <!-- begin story body -->
<!-- template inline -->
Seven Premier League weekend fixtures have fallen victim to the
adverse weather conditions enveloping England, with Wolves' match
at West Ham the latest to be called off.
MatthewLewis/GettyImages
The English elements hit football
Chelsea's game at Hull, Liverpool's clash with Tottenham, Aston
Villa's game at Wigan, Fulham's game against Portsmouth, Stoke's
trip to Burnley and Sunderland's fixture against Bolton at the
Stadium of Light have also been postponed.
Wigan decided to call off their match against Villa at the DW
Stadium at 8.30am on Saturday morning after a pitch inspection by
referee Stuart Attwell.
A statement on the club's official website read: "Wigan Athletic
have been forced to postpone this afternoon's Barclays Premier
League match against Aston Villa after the undersoil heating at the
DW Stadium failed late yesterday, Friday.
"Engineers spent most of the evening on site attempting to
repair the fault but have not been successful, with the problem
necessitating parts which were not available at such short
notice."
The big freeze has wreaked havoc with the fixture list in
England this weekend with the lower leagues also badly hit - not a
single match will be played League Two or the Conference.
The Premier League fixture list had remained intact until Friday
morning when the game between Fulham and Portsmouth at Craven
Cottage was the first to be postponed.
A club statement read: "Saturday's Premier League fixture
against Portsmouth at the Cottage has been postponed due to the
adverse weather conditions which are not expected to improve over
the next 24 hours.
"The safety of supporters is of paramount importance to the club
and following an inspection of the areas surrounding Craven Cottage
on Friday morning it was deemed unsafe for fans to travel.''
Burnley then announced that their game against Stoke City at
Turf Moor will not be going ahead due to safety reasons before
Bolton's trip to Sunderland was also called off.
Liverpool requested that their game with Spurs was also
postponed "for safety reasons" and by Friday afternoon the clash
had been cancelled, along with Chelsea's match with Hull at the KC
Stadium.
Birmingham have said that their pitch is completely playable
ahead of their match against Manchester United on Saturday evening
but, as with all games, there is a doubt about the pavements around
the ground.
Meanwhile, Manchester United have rearranged their home game
with Hull City for Saturday, January 23. The game should have been
played at the end of the month but was postponed due to the
rescheduling of the Carling Cup semi-finals.
Source:
http://soccernet.espn.go.com/news/story?id=722250&sec=england&cc=4716
West Ham and Wolverhampton tml's match also abandoned. =X