Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola has given an honest, but extremely sad assessment of the current state of modern football after the Spaniard admitted football is not ‘a special day any more’.
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The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has brought life to it’s knees and football, which is often a sanctuary to life’s burdens has unfortunately been unable to escape the novel virus’ wrath.
The ongoing pandemic which first rocked the global population nearly 12-months ago has seen football go through huge and unprecedented changes.
Arguably the hardest adjustment fans, players and staff have had to go through is the exiling of live spectators.
Fans from nearly all corners of the world have been forced to watch their favourite sport being played out through a television screen, unable to attend the stadiums and tasked with deciding between virtual silence or canned digital crowd noise.
There is no denying it; football just isn’t what it was this time last year and whether or not we’ll be able to get back to that time still remains to be seen.
Discussing the changes football has endured over the past year, City manager Guardiola has given a heartbreaking assessment of the once beautiful game.
Speaking to BBC Sport, Guardiola said: “Football was a joy when we played every three days in a routine, the players came here to the stadium and we had the spectators.
“Now it is not a special day any more. What’s next? Go here, go here, go here….Of course the players want to do it. It is incredible how they run but not with joy for the situation.
“It’s like all the people and families around the world. You don’t go to restaurants, you don’t go out. Even journalists, you cannot go to the press conference and see your friends, you are at home working and it is different.
“Football is not an exception. We go, we play and that is all.”