Revealed: Where Sheffield United will finish in the 2019/20 Premier League table - according to statistical model

Some clubs, predictably those in relegation trouble, have called for it to be suspended; others, like Liverpool, who are on the verge of a first Premier League title, want it to be played to a finish.

Julien Guyon, however, believes he has another way of deciding the season, if the coronavirus crisis gets worse rather than better. A French mathematician and football fan, the quantitative analyst has adapted the Elo calculation method which is used by Fifa to rank national teams.

His model predicts the number of points teams would have won in their remaining matches, taking into account the team they faced and other factors like home advantage.

Guyon's model had Liverpool, unsurprisingly, winning the league with a record 106 points but Sheffield United, who were seventh in the table when the season was suspended, finish in that position.

"There are no changes in the positions according to my model," Guyon wrote in The Times.

"One would expect Sheffield United to finish ahead of Wolves because they have one more game to play (both teams have 43 points), but the model predicts that Chris Wilder’s team will finish in seventh, with Wolves sixth, because United face stronger opponents and play six out of ten games away."

What Guyon's model cannot predict is whether seventh place is enough to earn a European spot - which presumably rests on the fate of the FA Cup in the current climate.

Manchester City’s Uefa ban will also impact the situation while the FA Cup winners would have earned a Europa League spot. But if a team already qualified for Europe lifts it, the place goes to the seventh-placed team in the league.

What happens if the FA Cup is unable to be completed is another problem for the game’s governing body to wrestle with in these unprecedented times.