The objections to restart plans are understandable and the game should pay attention, but ultimately clubs need to play games to survive

With each week the plans become a little more refined and with each week any final decision is pushed back. Football may return, and this is how it may look if it does, but nobody is sure, and any proposed date can only be provisional. Which is as it should be. In an age that often favours decisiveness over the decision itself, there is something vaguely comforting about a process that accepts the wisdom of waiting.

But in the background there is a crucial, nagging voice, and what it is saying is this: if football isn’t prepared to return, at least initially, in a form very different to the one it took before the virus, it may not return for a very long time – and for many clubs that means never.

Our cartoonist on the plans to resume the 2019-20 Premier League season and possible options to complete it

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• Dossena and Vialli settle one of the greatest games in Serie A history
• The Forgotten Story of ... Sampdoria’s only scudetto

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Related: The forgotten story of … Sampdoria's only scudetto | Rob Smyth

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This week’s roundup also features Monica Seles, the Windies and a bust-up between Souness and Dunphy

1) Gianfranco Zola at Chelsea. Zola at Napoli. And more of Zola in Serie A.

Gianfranco Zola making life difficult.

Our #OldSkoolSkillSkool feature on Chelsea TV is not to be missed... https://t.co/LSJmrcH0j2 pic.twitter.com/YbUgB1olE4

A radical solution is needed and the PFA has the money and the power to step in and help clubs that have no income for the foreseeable future

Last month I said the EFL was entering the most critical period in its history as it struggled to respond to the abrupt cessation of football. What we have seen since has elegantly illustrated the game’s inability to act decisively to protect professional football’s future. This is not a criticism of the individuals involved in negotiations, who are trying their best, but reflects structural flaws that prevent cohesive action. Put simply, it is clear the EFL and Professional Footballers’ Association cannot bring the key counter-parties to the table.

The first phase was characterised by the fight for cash given the disappearance of gate-related income. Although there was relatively swift agreement that a player wage deferral would help, it has been left to clubs and players to agree arrangements. Some players have deferred, some have not, and and the scale varies from club to club. The outcome was, in my view, too little and too late for many clubs.

In the latest in our series on how Covid-19 will change football, we look at its impact at grassroots and non-league level

This could be the end of grassroots football. The impact is going to be horrendous. The main problem now is we’re not getting money we would usually receive from training-session fees or fundraising, because they’re not taking place. That money goes towards subsidising teams for the next season, helping them with pitch fees, league fees, trophy presentations, etc.

The club from Leeuwarden were 11 points clear of the play-off places and heading for the Eredivisie when the Dutch season was annulled

It took only two games of the season for Erik Schouten to realise Cambuur were on to something. Nobody knew how a brand new team, which had almost entirely changed during the summer, would click but their first home fixture of 2019-20 dispelled any concerns. Go Ahead Eagles were beaten 5-0, succumbing to wave after wave of blistering raids, and a pattern for the next seven months had been emphatically set.

“That was the moment we believed everything was possible,” says Schouten, who had arrived from Volendam and was immediately made captain. “Playing attacking football, playing fast, defeating a really good side. We knew then that, if we played well, we could beat anyone.”

• Pardew departs Dutch club after just eight games in charge
• Assistants Chris Powell and Paul Butler also leave the club

Alan Pardew has left his position as the manager of Eredivisie club Den Haag by mutual consent, days after the Dutch season was cancelled.

Pardew was appointed in December and tasked with saving the club from relegation. The 58-year-old was unable to lead them out of the relegation zone, but the team were reprieved when the season was scrapped because of the coronavirus pandemic.

The league’s centralised structure should help during the pandemic but it is also vulnerable in a way that European competitions are not

The warning from Adrian Hanauer was stark. According to the Seattle Sounders majority owner, the shutdown caused by the Covid-19 pandemic could result in “astronomical” losses for Major League Soccer teams. “Hundreds of millions, billions, really big numbers,” he told the Sounder At Heart podcast earlier this month.

Hanauer’s remarks were in line with much of what is being said around the soccer world. The sport has never experienced anything like this with entire seasons on hold, soon to be abandoned in some cases, and competitions such as Euro 2020 and Women’s Euro 2021 pushed back a whole year. For all the meetings that have been held and contingency plans drawn up, nobody can guarantee when play will resume.

• President calls for resumption of football despite crisis
• Brazil has more than 5,900 deaths due to the coronavirus

Brazil’s president Jair Bolsonaro wants to see football competitions restart soon despite the country’s high number of coronavirus cases, arguing that players are less likely to die from Covid-19 because of their physical fitness.

Bolsonaro is one of the few world leaders that still downplays the risks brought by the coronavirus, which he has likened to “a little flu”.

• Amiens relegated, Lyon miss out on European qualification
• Lyon president says club will seek damages for financial losses

Amiens and Lyon have both reacted angrily to Ligue 1’s decision to officially end their season on Thursday and determine final league placings, European qualification and relegation amid the Covid-19 crisis.

The 2019-20 campaign was suspended as part of the French government’s steps to contain the spread of coronavirus last month. With some teams having played 27 matches and others 28, the French league (LFP) drew up the final standings according to a performance index – number of points per game weighed by head-to-head record.

Former Barcelona player and Chile coach on Camp Nou life, Guardiola and why Sánchez could yet shine for Manchester United

“Most of the time, you fail; there are many more defeats than victories,” Juan Antonio Pizzi says. He is right, even when it comes to his peer group – possibly the most successful coaching class in history – but it is still an unusual reflection for a man who was La Liga’s top scorer and, as a player and manager, won the league in three countries. All the more so when it is a reflection prompted by the time he led Chile to the 2016 Copa América. Minutes after winning the final, Pizzi sat before the press – and started talking about failure.

He laughs now but there was a lesson there. “It’s true: when you take over a team, most of the objectives you set, you fail to meet,” he says. “And however much you try to console yourself with your style, methodology, some improvement, what you want is to win and when you don’t, which is most of the time, disappointment comes. You lose more than you win and your mind is occupied more with defeat than enjoying victory, which is gone very quickly.”

• Team issues joint statement before planned return to training
• La Liga: ‘Playing football safer than going to supermarket’

Eibar have become the first La Liga side to publicly express concerns about the planned return to training, and have called for “responsibility” from league officials.

Clubs in Spain’s top two division are due to start individual training this week after testing for Covid-19 with matches behind closed doors planned for June. But in a strongly worded joint statement, the Basque club have raised doubts about the plan.

With the sporting calendar on hold during the coronavirus pandemic, football stars around the world are challenging each other to perform tricks with loo roll as part of the #stayathomechallenge to encourage fans to practise social distancing

Made in Senegal takes an in-depth look at the rise of Liverpool forward Sadio Mané, who is the current African player of the year. The documentary will be exclusively available across Europe on Rakuten TV’s free Rakuten Stories channel from 8 April.

Alphonso Davies was born in a refugee camp after his parents fled civil war in Liberia. He has since become the youngest footballer to play for Canada and won a Bundesliga title with Bayern Munich. The 19-year-old talks to Gary Lineker about his incredible journey

The Everton right-back joined Schalke on loan in pre-season and hopes to play against Borussia Dortmund on 16 May

As Jonjoe Kenny remembers the sights and smells that defined his childhood it is tempting, more so at a time such as this, to close your eyes and travel back with him. He can tell what, with a few bumps here and there, is the textbook story of a local boy made good, and Everton games were the focal points throughout. Kenny grew up in Kirkdale, virtually on the doorstep of Goodison Park, and the glimpse of a buzzing County Road brought the kind of sensory assault that would leave thousands pining today.

“It’s about a five-minute walk round the corner,” Kenny says. “On matchdays going to the stadium it was always busy in our area. The chippies were packed, the pubs were packed, and when you’re walking to the game through it all there’s no better feeling. As a kid growing up, it was such a big thing.”

Using the Fifa archive we rewatch a series of memorable games in search of answers we didn’t find at the time

“It was like knocking four quick times on the door of unhappiness” – Albert Camus, the Outsider

The World Cup final, France v Italy in Berlin’s Olympic Stadium. It’s still humid under the lights. The score is 1-1, the players wide-eyed but still running.

• Premier League can resume home and away, says Paul Barber
• ‘If Germany can, why can’t we make it happen’

Brighton’s chief executive, Paul Barber, has urged Premier League clubs to follow the Bundesliga’s lead and rethink proposals to complete the season at neutral venues.

“If Germany can, why can’t we?” said Barber, who believes the English top flight could resume behind closed doors with home and away matches, as planned in Germany from 16 May.

• Video call to follow league shareholders meeting on Monday
• Coronavirus testing plan still to be approved by clubs

Top-flight players are to hold talks with Premier League executives next week, before any attempt to restart the football season can be signed off.

Players are to be given the chance to air any concerns over Project Restart in a video-conference call likely to include representatives of all 20 clubs.

• Premier League could be played as normal, says Owen West
• ‘Tone demonises fans who have been very mature’

Police advice that Premier League clubs must play at neutral venues if they resume the season has “no rationale” and risks demonising supporters by assuming they will gather unsafely outside grounds, a former football policing commander has said.

Owen West, a recently retired West Yorkshire chief superintendent, told the Guardian that football clubs can help give a lead as local community organisations to any gradual easing of Covid-19 lockdown restrictions and do not need to be switched from their home grounds to play games.

In an empty stadium with strict coronavirus protocols enforced, probably the first spit- and snot-free match in football history drew legions of online fans to South Korea

So football is back. Jeonbuk Motors and Suwon Bluewings opened the coronavirus-delayed K-League season in an empty stadium in the south-west city of Jeonju on Friday evening and for legions of online fans around the world, starved of football by the pandemic, the exertions were a sporting balm. It is fair to say that no football match played on South Korean soil had attracted this level of international interest since the 2002 World Cup finals.

With the exceptions of Belarus, Burundi, Tajikistan and Nicaragua, the global game has been at a virtual standstill, presenting the K-League with an opportunity to fill the hole left by the postponement or cancellation of all other major competitions.

• Ifab gives green light but clubs expected to stick with it
• Vote needed on whether to allow five substitutions

Premier League clubs will debate whether to dump VAR for the remainder of the season – if it can be completed – after the International Football Association Board (Ifab) said that individual competitions can do so if they want to.

The clubs, who will hold a conference call on Monday, must also vote on another Ifab temporary amendment – whether to agree to the use of five substitutes in matches.

Figures from across the men’s professional game including managers, players and a scout, discuss how football will alter

When life has finally returned to normal, I think football will change for the better. We should see the reversal of a power balance that has swung the wrong way for too long, switching it back in favour of the clubs. I would certainly expect that to happen in the divisions below the Premier League, where the financial implications of Covid-19 are hitting particularly hard. Players and agents will have to lower their expectations, and we will see fewer instances of football clubs being held to ransom over deals and contracts.

• Scott Duxbury: ‘How is there any semblance of fairness?’
• League would ‘bear no resemblance to the one we started’

Watford have joined Aston Villa and Brighton in voicing objections to the Premier League’s plan to play out the season at neutral venues on police advice, claiming it would be unfair to relegate clubs on the basis of a competition that “bears no resemblance to the one that was started”.

Sitting just above the bottom three when the league was suspended and uncomfortably aware Villa could leapfrog them if they play and win their game in hand, Watford were due to play five of their remaining nine fixtures at Vicarage Road and feel that being deprived of home advantage could affect the number of points they gather.

Stage and screen actor best known for playing Pussy Galore in the 1964 Bond film Goldfinger and Cathy Gale in TV’s The Avengers

Many actors might have objected to being associated throughout their careers with a character called Pussy Galore. But Honor Blackman, who has died aged 94, revelled in the notoriety of the role of the aviator she played in the James Bond film Goldfinger (1964).

Having been knocked out with a tranquilliser gun by a hench- man, the first thing Bond (Sean Connery) sees when he regains consciousness is Blackman’s face leaning over him. “Who are you?”, he asks. “My name is Pussy Galore,” she says. “I must be dreaming,” he replies. Later, after trying a few judo moves on each other, they fall into a different kind of clinch.

My friend and colleague Tony Morgan, who has died aged 83 after contracting Covid-19, was one of the heroes of the early days of computers. As a computer engineer from the late 1950s, he was responsible for the installation of the pioneering Leo computers worldwide, including for the GPO (now BT) for telephone billing. After a 38-year career he remained an active member of the Leo Heritage Project, using his unrivalled knowledge to identify the company’s artefacts.

Born in Kenton, near Harrow, Middlesex, to William Morgan, an architect, and Millie (nee Ferguson), Tony went to Harrow County grammar school and, after getting four A-levels, did his national service with the RAF, where he was trained as an air-radar fitter.

My grandmother Edith Redstone, who has died aged 101, was a co-author, in her 70s, of the popular book Growing Old Disgracefully, which suggested ways in which women can get the most out of their later years. Its publication in 1993 led to a global tour by Edith and its five other authors, and in the UK precipitated the launch of a nationwide network of Growing Old Disgracefully groups that still exists today.

Edith met her co-authors – all women and all over 60 - in the early 1990s on a course about ageing at the Hen House co-operative in Yorkshire, where they hatched the idea of the book. Subtitled “new ideas for getting the most out of life”, it challenged accepted views of growing old, and encouraged readers to learn to age with a sense of self-esteem and playfulness.

Specialist in the control of chemical and biological warfare who guided experts and policymakers from east and west

Julian Perry Robinson, who has died aged 78, combined academic research with behind-the-scenes advocacy to enhance controls on some of the most inhumane weapons in the world. His focus was on issues related to chemical and biological warfare (CBW) and the international efforts to eradicate the use or possession of such weapons.

In the late 1960s, with cold war differences between the major powers on the control of biological weapons, he examined the challenges of CBW in factual terms rather than the rhetoric of the time. A key concept Julian promoted – that all disease-causing organisms and the toxins they produce should be considered biological weapons, unless held for clearly peaceful purposes – became the core of the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention, the first treaty to ban a whole class of weapons of mass destruction. This concept, which became known as the “general purpose criterion”, has meant the convention has not been overtaken by scientific and technological developments.

Renowned Welsh physicist whose work helped to forge Britain’s reputation as a global leader in climate science

The late 1980s marked a key moment for environmental science, matching triumph with looming disaster. Rising levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere had been observed since the late 1950s, at the remote Pacific observatory of Mauna Loa, but it was only after three decades of further research that concern over what this rapid accumulation of greenhouse gases might mean reached the desks of the world’s leaders.

At the time, politicians appeared receptive to scientific warnings in a way they rarely have been since. In 1987, world governments concluded the Montreal protocol, which still stands today as probably the most successful environmental intervention, phasing out the use of the ozone-depleting chemicals that had threatened to destroy the planet’s protective atmospheric layer.