Tottenham's Moussa Sissoko says he is feeling fine after undergoing knee surgery in January and that he is using shutdown to build up fitness in preparation for the return of the Premier League.
Sissoko went under the knife after suffering knee ligament damage in the 1-0 defeat at Southampton on New Year's Day and he was initially expected to be sidelined until mid-April.
The Frenchman recovered ahead of schedule and has been back in full training since before the Premier League was suspended on March 13.
Spurs are one of the only Premier League clubs who have continued to train as normal this week and, speaking to the club's in-house TV channel, Sissoko said: "I’m fine, my knee’s okay. I’ve been training with the team for nearly two weeks now and everything is okay. I’m trying to build up my fitness and trying to be ready for when we’re allowed to play again."
The Football Association, Premier League, EFL and women’s professional game, together with the PFA and LMA, announced on Thursday that the professional game in England will be further postponed until no earlier than April 30 due to the Covid-19 outbreak.
Sissoko urged supporters to follow UK government advice by staying at home and says the situation presents an opportunity to spend time with family.
"It’s a very strange, sad situation, all the world is affected," Sissoko said. "Everyday we can see people dying or very ill. We need to be sensible and try to follow protocols. Hopefully in a few weeks or a few months everything will be okay and everyone can go back to normal life and try to enjoy life.
"Every day I’m on the phone with [my family]," added Sissoko, who was in Le Blanc-Mesnil and has family in France. "At the moment they not going anywhere because in France, they can’t move, they are not allowed to go out, only to buy some food.
"Everyone needs to be careful and like I said, follow the protocols, stay at home and try to be safe, take care of your family. At the same time, it’s a good opportunity to spend time with your family and have some love together because as I said, at the moment the world is sad and we don’t like to see this kind of thing, but we need to stick together and hopefully, in a few weeks or few months, we’ll have a better world."
