Testing times for Fleetwood Town stars as training is so different

The club has carefully complied with all protocols but players have missed the social side to their daily routine.

Captain Paul Coutts told the Evening Express in his native Scotland: “You go through the Covid-19 testing in one changing room and then go straight out on to the pitch.

“You turn up in all your kit, then afterwards you go back in and leave your GPS unit and heart-rate monitor and it’s back in the car and away. There’s no socialising and it’s quite strange really.”

A new part of the routine is coronavirus testing and the midfielder added: “It’s not the most pleasant thing I’ve ever had. You get swabbed at the back of your throat and up your nose.

“And it’s not like the edge of your nostrils – it’s right up your nose and it feels like it’s behind your eyeballs. So it’s not the best experience but it’s something that has to be done. “It definitely puts your mind at ease. We’ve been getting tested on Mondays and Thursdays.

“But the doctor keeps reminding us that the test is out of date as soon as you get the results and you could catch it in between times. So it’s really important for us to follow the guidelines and be careful like everyone else.”

Defender Lewie Coyle is missing the dressing room camaraderie and told BBC Radio Lancashire: “Training has been very, very different. Usually the lads are in the changing room having the banter and the craic, and obviously you are in contact with the lads as much as you can be on a daily basis.”

To be back has been great despite having to keep your distance, and taking your own kit and waterbottles home.

“But even though things are so different, every one of us is buzzing and delighted to be back in the training ground and back on the pitches.”

But it’s been different on the pitches too as head coach Joey Barton told talkSPORT: “We are still not back to 11 v 11 or even small-sided games – and they are going to ask us to play probably the most important game in the club’s history.

“And it will be the same for Wycombe, Oxford and Portsmouth.”