Spain’s health minister Salvador Illa said Sunday it would be “imprudent” to promise the football season would restart before the summer as the country took steps to ease one of the world’s toughest coronavirus lockdowns. “I can’t tell you right now if professional football is going to be able to restart its activities before the summer. It would be imprudent on my part,” he said during a daily briefing on the coronavirus pandemic. The minister sounded a note of caution over La Liga plans to test players for the virus before returning to training and resuming a season suspended on March 12, saying giving priority to footballers might breach government policy.

“The diagnostic tests of any kind must be made available to the regional governments,” Illa said.

Before players can return to the pitch they will have to undergo COVID-19 screening tests. They will then continue to be monitored on a regular basis