Ole Gunnar Solskjaer has joked that Manchester United’s players’ partners can help them improve their finishing during the current lockdown period as he prepares for the rest of the season.
The Premier League is suspended until at least April 30 due to the Covid-19 pandemic and as a precaution all players and staff have been working from home for the past two weeks.
Players have been given individual programmes and diet plans to adhere to as they work alone in their home gyms. And Solskjaer, who has been in constant contact with his team, has suggested the players’ families may be able to help them out in the garden.
“The players have got individual programmes and they’ve got their own diets, of course, and this period could be used to work on something special, something specific for them and their roles and tasks,” Solskjaer told the club website .
“I’ve been in the garden, with the kids, working on finishing and the strikers should be working on finishing or their movement. Most of the players have got good facilities and decent gardens so, hopefully, their wives and girlfriends will be able to put some passes and crosses in.”
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United back the intention to finish the season when it is safe to do so and Solskjaer has been using his time working from home to plan for the remaining fixtures which the club hope will be played.
“For the actual job, I keep in touch and communicate with the staff and the players. Of course, I’m used to seeing them every day for hours and hours, so it’s different,” Solskjaer said.
“I just keep in touch with them on WhatsApp groups and messages, and we plan for whenever we get back and what kind of sessions for when we do start. But it’s such an unknown and we don’t really have an idea and are not 100 per cent about when we'll start.
“That’s the good thing now with technology and we’re lucky in that sense. We can keep in touch and see each other. We can send messages and get a reply quickly, and we can do the old-fashioned phone call sometimes and speak just on the phone. So we keep in touch regularly.”
Solskjaer was given a boost earlier in the week when the club confirmed Marcus Rashford was able to step up his training after a positive scan on his back.
The England international has missed months of action after fracturing his spine but a scan, which was undertaken at Carrington with a radiologist from a private hospital recently, revealed an improvement to his injury and he has been given the all clear to step up his recovery.
Paul Pogba, who has only made seven appearances in the league this season, has also been making strides in his own recovery following ankle surgery earlier this year.