Following a meeting on Wednesday morning, Premier League shareholders have unanimously voted in favour of resuming contact training.
In another step closer towards restarting the current Premier League campaign, Premier League officials today met to agree upon ‘Stage Two of the Return to Training Protocol‘; as per the Premier League’s official channels.
With players’ health and safety at the forefront of the EPL’s decision to permit contact training, ‘strict medical protocols’ have been put in place to ensure that these sessions are as safe as possible.
These protocols consist of three main points:
- all equipment and surroundings must be sterilised before and after training
- prolonged periods of interaction must be omitted from sessions in order to mitigate the risk of exposure to COVID-19, e.g. set-pieces and close marking drills
- players and staff will continue to be tested twice a week for COVID-19
BREAKING: Premier League clubs have voted to resume full-squad contact training as they work towards resuming the season pic.twitter.com/NE2E5Qcl0w
— B/R Football (@brfootball) May 27, 2020
According to the report, the go-ahead for this next phase was agreed upon in a collaboration with ‘clubs, players, managers, the PFA, LMA and government’.
Despite this however, a handful of players have continued to voice their doubts regarding how much of a priority their welfare truly is.
Just a week ago, Watford captain Troy Deeney stated that he would not be reporting to training for fears of his well-being. Furthermore, Saturday saw the news break that Chelsea midfielder N’golo Kante would be prepared to miss the entirety of the season’s remaining fixtures, amidst similar safety unease.
N'Golo Kante is prepared to miss the rest of the Premier League season, if it resumes, amid fears over returning to Chelsea training due to the coronavirus pandemic.
— Sky Sports (@SkySports) May 23, 2020
Regardless of the ongoing deliberations, the relationship between soe players and the PFA remains frictitious.
Just how many other players will follow Deeney and Kante’s suit is yet to be seen as the Premier League’s return grows ever closer ahead of a proposed June 16th date.
