Prem is at phase one of four for a return – one-in, one-out at training, toilets closed and food through the car window

WE still do not have a restart date for the Premier League but we are at least back in training . . . of sorts!

At West Ham we’re now in the first of four phases — the commencement of individual training.

West Ham players are training individually on their return to Rush Green – with a one-in, one-out policy

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The next phase is contact training, the third is playing the league games and the fourth is playing international matches.
So during the first phase our players are training by themselves at the club’s Rush Green base.

They arrive in their own car, dressed in their kit, go on the pitches and do their individual training, then get back in their car and go home.

And then the next player turns up and does the same — it’s a one-in, one-out policy that all clubs are now following.

No contact is allowed between the player and anyone else — although we do have doctors in case a player has a medical emergency — and social distancing MUST remain in place.

Gyms and communal areas like the canteen are firmly closed.

There will be new guidelines which include strict protocols in place to deal with the process from the point a player leaves his home to travel into the training ground, right the way through to leaving again after his individual session.

These include not being allowed to use the toilet to not being able to eat there, unless food is delivered to the car in a drive-through takeaway style. Although who cooks it and where they cook it is anyone’s guess!

We hope to move to phase two — contact training — when it is safe to do so and when the plan is signed off by the Government and Public Health England.

Even then, medical and physio treatment will be kept to a minimum.

The key here is to make the environment as safe as it can possibly be because we want to be able to restart the games and finish our season.

And to do that we have to be ready — otherwise we’ll end up like France, Belgium and Holland, who have all had their season curtailed.

So clubs are all now producing their own Covid-19 Operational Policy, which will include testing players, staff, broadcasters and operational staff twice a week.

Again, testing will be approved by the Government, done independently and centrally administered at various testing stations, with the results delivered within 24 hours.

The most important aspect of all this is not what we, as chairmen and CEO’s of clubs want the protocols to be, but that the players and managers agree and are comfortable with them and that they believe it is safe to commence contact training and play games.

Without their approval this is going nowhere, so it’s my intention to take my players through this in detail. We have to ensure that training is as safe as it can be — and they have to agree.

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But we do still have a way to go to even get to phase two — contact training.

And then it’s further to get to phase three — playing games — and even further to phase four and international matches, with all the travel restrictions and isolation periods on returning to the UK.

There are a lot of obstacles to overcome and no doubt many compromises to make.

Phase three will include discussions on the possibility of playing at neutral grounds, which no one wants, but it’s clear that the location of the games when the league recommences will be subject to approval from both the Government and Sports Grounds Safety Authority.

They could argue neutral grounds better protect the welfare of all involved and reduce the burden on public services like police and ambulance.

But like everything else, nothing has been agreed as we are still in phase one.

At yesterday’s meeting, every club said it wants the season to restart.

We all know that it is going to take a lot of working together, good faith, careful thought and compromises if we have any chance of that happening.

The only common theme from all the Prem clubs is that any compromises have to be fair and uphold the integrity of the game.

Players and managers have to be key decision-makers on the protocols as there is a long way to go from where we are now to actually getting playing again.

Playing the rest of the season at neutral grounds is a possibilityCredit: Getty

Source: Soccer - thesun.co.uk