Let's get right into it.

We're gonna start by concentrating on football on the effect that Corona virus is having on that.

So I want to take you back in time.

We get Mikel Arteta testing positive.

We get Callum Hanson, a Oi testing positive for the virus that led to the Premier League meeting.

Suddenly there's no football.

Steve, let's start with you.

What were your thoughts when you heard there was gonna be no football for the foreseeable future?

I think at that time nobody could fully kind of compute.

That is so going from playing football to know football, I think I thought, for instance, that possibly we would go behind closed doors at some of the league's in Europe were doing, especially in Italy.

They've been doing that for a couple of weeks, but then suddenly, to go from that possibility, the possibility of no football whatsoever, I think, was a huge step and people are still debating.

Whether that is has been the right move for the other.

Sports are still playing rugby league.

Francis is still playing and but I think football really have no option once.

Mikel Arteta, Callum Hotchner, Doi Once they tested positive, I think that was no wriggle room.

It'll for the FAA impregnated.

I think they have to call it often.

I think that was the right decision because we really don't know what's gonna happen.

Do it.

I think everybody's in the unknown.

Unknown now uncharted Waters.

We've never been here before, so I think even if some people might say, Well, look, the virus hasn't completely hit really hard in the UK yet.

We know it's going to, so if there's an over reaction, if people look at it that way, I think it's better to be safe than sorry and Melissa thinks, obviously seem to develop rapidly towards the end of the week.

In Wednesday, now you were actually in Madrid for the Liverpool Athletico Madrid game way.

Yeah, it was a man field field.

It was strange times to actually be at a football match when you know what's happening around Europe.

When you knew that Atletico Madrid fans weren't able to watch their own team in Spain went allowed to travel within Spain and yet you know we're on Merseyside for this game.

It was an incredible game and it was a little bit offer relief for those 120 minutes to just pores and forget about what was going on.

But at the same time, in the back of your head, there was a slaughter off.

Should we actually still be pretending that everything is normal and football should be carrying on?

Obviously, the way things escalated meant that while it was weird to go from football to absolutely no football, it was the only decision on the table.

I mean, you know, you can put games behind closed doors and you can say fans can watch on TV, but if you don't actually have players and coaching staff available, there is no foot.

Obviously, that game games were being played behind closed doors, the PSD game and thousands of fans outside the stadium or there weren't exactly so.

It kind of under the whole point off.

Not having mass gatherings of fans went listening to them.

They still wanted to show their support, and so they were doing that on Mass.

Still, in and around the stadium's obviously, still taking the tubes on all that said wasn't actually being a preventative measure at all, and I think that was also taken into consideration.

I think for football fans there's a bit of confusion as well because they saw at the time that English football is canceling the whole of the professional game.

You have Children racing going on.

Exactly a lot of fans, you know, people I spoke to was saying I'm gonna minute how can Children have and that is a mass gathering, you know, it's a huge gathering.

I know it's out, out in the air, but a lot of it is indoors in hospitality and packs to get down on the drinking, tense, everything.

It It's a very intense, and former friends would say to me, How could I tell him?

Go on yet they're closing down football.

What on earth to probably do now, though, if the season can't be completed, what are they doing?

Well, I think that's the that is the crux of the matter, I personally think, and they have to find a way to finish its season.

They really must find a formula to perhaps get a six week window where they can finish the season, because I think the ramifications of not finishing the season will be huge going forward and I think this could have a knock on effect, not for just this season but next season and maybe future seasons.

Everybody is actually focusing at the moment on Liverpool's you know, the title.

Is it going to be given to them or not?

I suspect it will be.

But I think the greater situation doesn't involve Liverpool.

It involves relegation because of the huge financial ramifications that a team being relegated or not being relegated or perhaps legal.

West Brom's not coming from the championship into the Premier League.

He's gonna have huge ramifications, I think probably legal ramifications, possibly as well.

I know we're in unprecedented times and a so called act of God that this this virus is no avoids.

Quite a lot of the insurance is that clubs and stakeholders have have in place to deal with this.

But I do think that if they don't find a way to finish this season, I think there's gonna be enormous problems going forward where you mentioned null and void, Karen Brady wrote in the Sun.

She wants to season null and void as journalists.

Melissa, What did you make of that?

I thought that was very self serving.

I do not think that that's the way forward, I think collaboration on dhe thinking off, not just what would benefit you and your club, but the wider lead in general.

We talking, We talk about relegation and we talk about whether Liverpool will win the title and stuff.

I think those are small subjects to be discussing when Cubs could go out of existence.

When you have people who are casual staff who are worried about when they're going to get work again, their livelihoods are destroyed.

You've got freelance journalists, you know, being put out of work.

You've got scouts who are unable to fulfill bad duties and also at this period will be let go there.

So much uncertainty and the worst thing we can do right now is view this from a selfish point of view from the executives I've spoken to in terms off the associations and from senior officials at clubs.

The greater wool is to finish the season because that is the fairest outcome.

You've also got C area Liga, the Bundesliga all coming out and saying the same thing they want their domestic season finished.

That's the priority, apart from the legalities around it and, you know, commercial knock on effects and broadcast revenue and all that, I think just for the integrity of the competition.

If the season can be finished, however, it needs to be finished.

That needs to be the solution.

And Steve, this is just a massive week isn't here, and I suppose it all starts tomorrow.

With that you Atia anything?

Yeah, absolutely.

I mean, some of the points Melissa is making their about finishing the season well, clearly, that's going to impact on your 2020.

I think we all recognize now that that is probably not going to happen.

I think the meeting the way for meeting tomorrow.

The teleconference between the 55 member associations, I think will determine that playing euro 2020 in the time that it was allocated is just not going to be feasible now.

And I think they will defer for a year, and that is going to buy perhaps a man calendar time for the various leagues Spain, Germany, France, the UK to get their league to a conclusion, a natural conclusion, because I think if you don't get it to a natural conclusion.

You're then creating enormous problems to yourself because somewhere somebody somewhere along the line will feel aggrieved that they haven't got a fair crack of the whip in the way.

Whatever way, they come to a decision.

Thio, determine it.

Talk.

This talk varies in there.

Yet we all want to see these games played, and hopefully it will happen.

But play it.

We've spoken to a physiologist today who said there's a real problem for Playersfitness, given that they know these are highly trained athletes and suddenly they're not playing.

And then do you not worry that they're gonna be asked to do an awful lot in a very short space of time?

Just so we get a winner on, we get a team that goes down and the team that comes up.

I know there is definitely a concern over that on Dhe, speaking to physios and stuff.

All the players have tailored programs as they would do over, you know, the summer break and stuff as usual.

But But then, when they come back from their summer break, they obviously have a preseason off conditioning.

This in this instance that's not possible.

So there are.

They are trying clubs to mitigate that and to give pays as much information as possible and arm them with as much sort of preparation as possible so they can be best prepared.

It's obviously not the ideal scenario and I think everybody's trying apart from those with self serving interests, to make the very best out of a situation that no one knows how to handle.

It's unprecedented on DDE.

You know, there's we don't know where the games will be able to go ahead in April.

We know that the dates at the moment is a placeholder, while everybody figures out what's happening.

But if everybody comes together and the willpower is to finish the season, I think everybody can find a way to make it possible in like the best way that we can do because honestly, trying to find out the answers when football is such a small bit and it's being swayed by everything else, the authorities cannot control what's going to happen in a wider context.

Off societies think in terms of fitness for the players, which is obviously and gonna be a key issue.

There's fitness and there's much fitness on you know, you're almost going toe face a situation where and when football does resume, it's almost going to be like a pre season in many ways.

Andi.

It's going to take time for those players, those clubs, those teams to get back into the rhythm of how it was before they finished.

Now that might benefit some teams, perhaps, who are having a bit of a nightmare at the moment.

Ah, although it could damage other teams who are maybe pushing for to reach the Champions League to reach the Europa League to get promotion into the Premier Li, it could hamper them because they might lose momentum.

I'm sure they will lose momentum.

So it's gonna be a really difficult situation.

And I think the key people in this air going to be the medical teams that physios at the clubs to try to formulate a plan to get players to maintain a level of fitness that is going to be sufficient for them to be able to start whenever not Belize wrong again.