Championship even more vulnerable and Leeds United might bag promotion minus the fears - David Prutton

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There’s a small minority who believe that looking at other countries and taking a lead from them or reacting to what they have done is a sign of weakness.

But I think we are beyond that. We just want to get things dealt with in a way that is effective.

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I am sure the inquests will come later, the inquests at the very highest level into how this was dealt with, what was foreseen and what was handled as and when it happened.

But right now, people in positions of power whether you are Richard Masters at the Premier League, Rick Parry at the EFL or Aleksander Ceferin at UEFA, there’s got to be discussions and broad debates and everyone’s voice has got to be heard.

The global health of the population is at the very top of this tree and as it works down the health and the fitness of the Premier League and the Football League needs to be maintained.

The EFL have this week told their players not to return to training until May 25 at the earliest when the date initially stated was today – May 16.

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EFL chairman Rick Parry has also said that the EFL season must be completed by July 31 so you could say that a later return to training leaves the Championship season very vulnerable.

WHAT NEXT? Leeds United's fans look on behind winger Jack Harrison in February's 1-0 win at Middlesbrough. The Whites have played just two games since. Photo by George Wood/Getty Images.WHAT NEXT? Leeds United's fans look on behind winger Jack Harrison in February's 1-0 win at Middlesbrough. The Whites have played just two games since. Photo by George Wood/Getty Images.
WHAT NEXT? Leeds United's fans look on behind winger Jack Harrison in February's 1-0 win at Middlesbrough. The Whites have played just two games since. Photo by George Wood/Getty Images.

But it has always been vulnerable because we have always looked at it from different incarnations of ‘what if.’

If you shorten the time frame it is less time in between games and less time for logistics to be thoroughly worked out.

And it’s intriguing because we have spoken about the points per game ratio and even that is now being pulled apart with certain people suggesting you should only do it after the first half of the season.

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All in all, another week goes by and it gets about as clear as mud and we sit with bated breath to see what happens from the top down.

BLAST FROM THE PAST: Leon Constantine, left, in Leeds United's FA Cup first round replay against Hereford United at Elland Road in November 2007. Photo by Alex Livesey/Getty Images.BLAST FROM THE PAST: Leon Constantine, left, in Leeds United's FA Cup first round replay against Hereford United at Elland Road in November 2007. Photo by Alex Livesey/Getty Images.
BLAST FROM THE PAST: Leon Constantine, left, in Leeds United's FA Cup first round replay against Hereford United at Elland Road in November 2007. Photo by Alex Livesey/Getty Images.

I am trying put myself in the shoes of a Leeds United fan through all of this.

You could be sat there thinking you want to get the season sorted because you want these games played because you want Leeds to go up. But there’s still a fear there.

You might have fears about the team hitting the buffers again and that’s just part and parcel of being a Leeds fan I guess. You’ve just got to get your head around that.

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But there’s obviously a chance of the EFL suddenly saying the league is done and dusted and this lot – including Leeds – are going up.

If that happens, it would be a season that we would remember forever and it would go down history but I’m sure there would still be at least a portion of Leeds fans are thinking ‘if they do call it off and we get promoted then I will be absolutely buzzing.’

We saw the heartbreak last season, we have seen how well they have done this campaign and as soon as the season becomes suspended you have different opinions coming forward about what should happen, even though we are not too far down the line of that becoming any clearer.

But it is commendable that United’s players are continually saying they want to get this finished on the pitch.

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All we have got at this moment in time is opinions and column inches of people giving their opinion on what could and should happen.

But there is a wonderful simplicity of being a footballer.

Obviously there is pressure and thoughts about what might happen in the future and I understand it is going to be a very testing time and we understand where this all fits in the grand scheme of things.

But there will be players without a club in all of this and there will be players of all different ages looking to answer different questions in their career and they will have to cross that bridge when they come to it.

But it’s refreshing that the Leeds players are just saying ‘please, when it is safe, let us get a kit on, let’s chuck a pair of boots on and let’s get back on the pitch, that big green thing.’

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Then they can run their backsides off and enjoy a football match.

We are all in this together and we are all avidly hovering up all forms of information because we want answers and because it’s such an uncertain time.

But that portion of being a footballer, the 90 minutes on a Saturday or whatever it is, is great.

You have got one aim, to win the game, and it is a wonderfully finite portion of time that you can lose yourself in enjoying what you are doing the most.

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But there are obviously more important things and this week I was asked by Leeds to take part in their weekly Clap For Our Carers video saluting the work of the NHS.

The media chap at Leeds sent me a video and said ‘send me something along the lines of this.’

I watched it and it had Mark Viduka on it and some other big hitters and I was thinking ‘Christ, you must have run out of big hitters if you have come to me.’

My mate texted me who is a big fan saying he saw me and I said ‘I think Leon Constantine must have been busy so they came knocking down the doors.’

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But it takes 15 seconds to get yourself in the best light and make sure you have brushed your teeth that particular week and it was nothing but a pleasure.

It is utterly, utterly humbling.

The workers of the NHS are wonderful and they are a generation and spectrum of people who are utterly selfless and utterly devoted to what they do as a vocation. It is their life.

Whatever kind of echelon you operate in within that, whether you are a top surgeon or in the nitty gritty of keeping a hospital ticking along, what they have done is absolutely outstanding.

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