Aston Villa has distanced themselves from a claim made by their sporting director that they should be allowed avoid relegation from the Premier League.
Jesus Garcia Pitarch told the Game Time programme on Cope in his native Spain that if the Premier League can't recommence then his club - along with Norwich and Bournemouth - should stay up.
Garcia-Pitarch also says Liverpool should be awarded the title given their 25-point lead at the top, but added, "this is a personal opinion."
Top flight officials are due to meet later this week to discuss how best to complete this season.
But with no firm end date to the crisis in sight, it appears nearly impossible that a consensus could be reached.
West Ham vice-chair Karren Brady broke ranks with other clubs at the weekend claiming it would be "fair and reasonable' to declare the 2019-20 season null and void, without champions awarded and without teams relegated. West Ham are just two-points from safety.
Garcia-Pitarch told Game Time, "If the peak of the Coronavirus is to occur in May, no one thinks of a competition in which players, coaches, and health personnel of the club will continue to appear every day.
"There are clubs that do not see admissible that the competition resumes on June 30th. The most reasonable thing that everyone thinks is that, if the league has to be stopped, that there are no relegations.
'There is a certain unanimity that there should be no relegation."
On an official basis at least, Villa have attempted to put some clear water between themselves and the comments of Pitarch saying in a statement, "The views attributed to Mr Garcia-Pitarch in the Spanish media are not those of Villa. Now is not the time to be speculating about the future arrangements for PL football this season."
#avfc statement distancing themselves from views of sporting director Jesus Garcia-Pitarch: “The views attributed to Mr Garcia-Pitarch in the Spanish media are not those of Villa. Now is not the time to be speculating about the future arrangements for PL football this season.”
— John Percy (@JPercyTelegraph) March 16, 2020
