COVID-19: Return to training delayed due to tests

The first unforeseen event in LaLiga’s plans to return to normal. The tests will not arrive until next Tuesday, so training cannot be resumed on the scheduled date.

LaLiga has informed the 42 First and Second Division clubs of the bad news regarding the return to training. The tests will not be available until next Tuesday, which will delay the return to training.

The calendar has suffered its first delay. The return to training was scheduled for Monday 4th May, but if the tests don’t arrive until the 5th, the date has to be delayed.

The tests will be done to the players between the 5th and the 7th of May, so it will not be possible to return to training until at least the 7th, as the results take about 48 hours to be known.

The delay is not serious, but it shows the fragility of any plan in its early stages of implementation. The sooner an inconvenience occurs, the more stages it affects.

LaLiga, despite having already received government approval to return to training, has made it conditional on the players being tested.

For what it does not have the approval is precisely for the realization of these tests in mass. This Thursday, the Working Group for the Promotion of Sport (which includes the CSD, La Liga, AFE and RFEF, among others) will meet and, according to ‘Mundo Deportivo’, will almost certainly approve the mass testing of players.

“Sport is going to come back. It will be done in phases and respecting all the measures established by the Health Ministry, but sport is going to come back”, declared Irene Lozano, president of the CSD, who also assured that the return of football “is vital”.

Therefore, every day that passes, despite the setbacks, is a day less until the return of football is a reality. Even if it is behind closed doors.