Pre-season planning is ‘the least of my worries’ – Warne
IT’S GOOD TO TALK: Leeds United captain Liam Cooper and his team-mates are keeping in touch with head coach Marcelo Bielsa, using the online messaging system WhatsApp.
AS managers go, Paul Warne prides himself on his planning and meticulous nature more than most.
It will surprise few who know the Rotherham United chief that his attention to detail had extended to mapping out preseason plans for next season some weeks ago.
But the coronavirus pandemic has endured that Warne’s schedule will have to be scrapped, in all likelihood, with a new one drawn up in the future.
Although quite when that will be is anyone’s guess with football on lockdown and likely to be for the foreseeable future.
On having to rip up his preseason programme and start again, Warne said: “That was in place and I am presuming that is kiboshed.
“In fairness, that is the least of my worries. The positive is all the games will be organised (in the future) as there will still be preseason games, even if it is three months later down the line.
“Hopefully, once we know that the season ends and the next one starts, all those things are pretty easy to shift down the calendar a little bit.
“We had organised everything – but the whole recruitment and transfer window is going to change.
“Considering what is going on in the world, that will be quite manageable when that does come around.”
Football is suspended for another five weeks until April 30 at the earliest, although most pragmatists expect it to be much later when games are allowed to be staged again and Warne is bracing himself for a further delay.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if the deadline and starting date got put back again in April,” he commented.
“But hopefully, we will get through the worst and life comes back to normal.
“It is a difficult time for a lot of people and I hope they get through it the best they can.
“It is just a really surreal place. In fairness to the government and EFL, they are all trying to do what they think is right.
“But no-one knows at this time what is right and wrong. In two years time, we might look back and say: ‘maybe we should have done this and that.’
“I don’t think there’s an answer which will please everybody.
“If they cancel the league, then it would be hugely disappointing.
“But in the bigger scheme of things, we can look back at 2020 in a few years to come and hopefully say we all lived through it and it all got back to normal.”