Leeds United capable of dealing with EFL's hectic but sensible action plan - David Prutton

And I think we all understand and have a grasp on what the most important things are right now which is the global fight against coronavirus and the general health of the public.

That is absolutely paramount and we understand that.

People might talk about football operating in a moral vacuum and not paying respect to what is happening on the front line but I don’t think the lawmakers and the organisations such as the Premier League and the EFL and what have you are operating with a blind ignorance to what the bigger picture is.

They are employed to try and make decisions and to try and develop plans and EFL chairman Rick Parry and the EFL and all its members will have been in constant dialogue with everyone.

The plans outlined in their letter this week were not just something thrown out there willy-nilly and what they have suggested is an option.

You can call it a plan but really it’s an option because we don’t know what is going to happen and in a week or two week’s or a month’s time things might have changed for the better or things might have changed for the worst.

Quite obviously we are hoping for the former but the EFL have laid something out which is a hectic but feasible way of getting one season finished before we start another which tends to be the common goal of everyone involved.

People want one season to finish before another starts and I get the feeling that is the case across the board but within the boundaries of everyone’s health and well being and everything associated with putting on not just a football match but several football matches in several different leagues.

There seems an air of positivity about it all which is helpful in this unending cycle of news that we hear of how the general state of the world is.

If you are a football fan of Leeds United or of any team in the EFL, it gives you something to think about and something to perhaps look towards.

And from a planning point of view, it tells the players to pull the reins in on the fitness stuff that you are doing and gear up again to begin training at a time which is completely upside down in terms of getting fit again in May.

Normally that is when you are dialling it down and looking forward to how the season ends whichever way it goes and looking forward to having a break and a quick refresh before you go again in July.

There are going to be a lot of games crammed into a small space of time under this option but in the grand scheme of things it is not front line medicine, it’s not working for the NHS and it’s not life or death situations.

It’s a way that football can cover what it’s got control over - getting games done and getting to the end of one season before we start another.

But it’s such a fluid environment and fluid situation that we are all operating in and we all waiting from the top down to see the reaction to lockdown measures, self isolation and quarantine.

We are waiting to see whether that helps us suppress the curve and whether that does help us to get our NHS through this in robust health having dealt with the worst of it.

The way of setting things out, maybe that can be daunting to players.

But regardless of what your opinion of a footballer is or what a footballer stands for or where they are coming from socially, culturally, economically or financially, they can say ‘do you know what, we have seen people, we have sat at home, we have said do the NHS a favour and stay at home and stay on lockdown and stay away from other people.’

If they get to a position where they can get out and football can get done, that’s when footballers can say ‘we have donated wages and we have done as much as we can so give us something easy to do, playing football matches.’

Get through them and get them done.

People might have seen the at home with Leeds United feature that I took part in this week with Luke Ayling, Liam Cooper and Kalvin Phillips for Sky which was great fun.

All three of them spoke very responsibly about the current situation and there was a real sense of camaraderie between them, even though they were all sat at different screens in different geographical locations.

There was a real fondness between them and that dynamic that you remember from being in a dressing room.

In any walk of life and with any group of people there are different dynamics and some people you naturally gravitate towards but there was a genuine sense of empathy and fondness between them.

There was that light hearted ribbing and the micky taking which goes on in every single workplace but can be even more ferocious in a football dressing room.

But there was also a nice insight into how they are keeping fit which obviously might change a little bit now.

You got a genuine sense of them actually missing that day to day time and each other’s company which I really thought was quite sweet.