Madrid (AFP)

"La Liga is back!". If the media are delighted this Sunday by the hoped resumption of the championship after two months of stoppage, the Spanish League will have to face many challenges to ensure its smooth running between heat, closed doors, and health risks.

After closely observing the Bundesliga "crash test", the first major championship to restart last weekend, Spain, badly affected by the pandemic, will launch in its turn and will have to take the fold of empty stadiums and strict sanitary measures to end the season safely.

On Saturday, the Spanish government gave the green light for a recovery from the week of June 8. The League has not yet communicated on the exact date of return nor on its recovery protocol, but the body that manages professional football in Spain should do so "at the start of next week", said his boss on Sunday evening Javier Tebas on the Movistar Plus channel.

- Overwhelming heat -

"La Liga is back!" exclaimed on their front page the daily Marca, the best-selling of Spain which decorated its front page with a heart formed by the twenty badges of the clubs of Liga, the Catalan newspaper Sport as well as As.

Tebas said on Sunday evening that he hoped to resume the championship on Thursday 11 June at 10 p.m. (8 p.m. GMT), with the Andalusian derby between Betis and Sevilla FC as the curtain raiser.

The La Liga boss had previously said he was "very happy" with the announcement of this resumption, but he will now have to redouble his efforts to face the immense challenges that lie before him. "We cannot let our guard down," said the leader.

Because the last eleven days of the championship will be played this summer probably behind closed doors and in oppressive heat.

During a working meeting with the League over the weekend, the main players' union in Spain (AFE) asked that "cool breaks" be observed when temperatures fluctuate between 28 and 32 ° C, and that training and matches are postponed when they exceed 32 ° C, which is common in summer in Spain.

Valence CF, for example, trained in small groups below 28 ° C on Saturday.

The AFE also asked that a compulsory rest of 72 hours minimum be respected between two matches for the same team, while the League had announced with ardor that there would be "football every day" of the week .

- The injury, "torment" of the players -

This point is debated because the League and the Spanish Football Federation (RFEF), in disagreement on the fact of broadcasting football on Monday, already went to court on February 20 and 21. The judgment has not yet been pronounced.

But the League is pushing, because the economic stakes are gigantic: Tebas had estimated at the beginning of April at a billion euros the losses in the event of a permanent cessation of the season, against 300 million in the event of recovery without spectators.

By the start of the game, players, who moved from individual training to small group sessions on May 18 while continuing to adhere to strict sanitary measures, will have almost three weeks to prepare.

A minimum for the AFE, which required 15 to 20 days. "We want to return to competition, but we have to go phase after phase to get back in shape. We will not have matches to test our feelings, we will enter directly into the competition", feared the winger and captain by Levante, José Luis Morales, in Marca on Saturday.

"What concerns us most is what can happen at the physical level, injuries. (...) These two months have increased the risk of injury", commented the Colombian central defender of Espanyol Barcelona Bernardo Espinosa Friday to the media of his club.

"This is what torments my teammates the most. We must regain muscle and functional tone, and reduce this risk which has increased, not only because of the time we spent without playing, but also because of this weird time we’ve been through, and because of the high temperatures, "he added.

© 2020 AFP