As difficult as it might be for the Fermanagh senior footballers to keep themselves motivated and their fitness levels up as they await the announcement as to when football will return, their coach Leon Carters is in probably a more testing position as he tries to manage the work load of 45 players hoping to be part of the squad for 2021.

And he has to do it all without coming face to face with those players as Covid has forced the postponement of collective training in the GAA.

It is a different set up to the first lockdown last year when play was halted midway through the league campaign and nobody really knew what was going to happen.

While there is still no definitive date of return to competitive football, Leon has pencilled in the end of March/ start of April for the National League to begin.

Pre season for Fermanagh would have usually consisted of putting in the hard yards on pitches throughout the county, but this year it’s a bit different.

Most of the players are working alone, keeping in touch with Leon through Strava, calls and texts in an attempt to be in the best shape for when they return to collective training.

“At the minute I’m planning for the league to start competitively in last week in March or start of April,” Leon stated.

With indications that collective training might be allowed to resume on March 5, it gives a three week window for the players to get back up to speed as a team.

But Leon believes it isn’t long enough: “Normally a pre season you are talking a minimum of six weeks to get someone, who has been doing little activity ready, for the demands of the sport.

“The good thing about it is we have a massive young squad and a lot of them are students and they are kind of living like professionals.

“They have been able to get their recovery because normally they don’t and it’s all monitored.

“I have to make sure their loads are right so when they go back into training we don’t want the case where they are going from doing very little to going into a 15km week.

“So I have to make sure they are getting enough high speed running and at the minute there is a lot of focus on their aerobic capacity and making them more robust.”

Because of the remote way they are doing training, Leon says there is more responsibility on the players to look after their training because the management are not watching them week in, week out on the training field which is usually the case.

“The modern day player craves structure and loves being educated and I am in constant contact with them.

“They have to make sure their base is higher because if we want to get to the ceiling quicker they have to have a better base.

“There’s no point having a low base and then trying to get somewhere quicker. It’s not going to happen, they are just going to breakdown. But they have all embraced that.”

The first lockdown saw many of players invest in their own equipment which has been beneficial for Leon when setting out programs, while he has had to be a bit more creative with others.

As well as that he has to take into account the current life situations they are in, whether they are a student or working full time with a family.

“I’ve got to show a bit of empathy towards that and making sure they are all moving towards the one goal.

“You have someone like Eoin Donnelly who has been on the panel years and developed to where he is now and you’ve got someone like Josh Largo-Elis or Micheal Glynn who are going to be exciting players in the future but you have to do the right things for them.

“You can’t try and cut out A and B to get to C quicker. You have to go down the proper avenues.”

When they do eventually get back to collective training, Leon believes that buzz players get from working together will help push the players on further as they look towards a difficult Division Three campaign with games against Cavan, Derry and Longford.

But for now, it is up to them to get to the required level for when that day arrives.

“I don’t want one boy coming back having put in too much and I certainly don’t want someone coming back having put in too little and then jumping in.

“But football is a team sport and they will get that bounce from interacting with each other and being competitive with each other.”

There are many new players in the squad who the management have not been able to cast their eye over in an inter-county set up and Leon knows that when they do start training as a group again, these players will have to show quickly if they are cut out at the highest level.

“We have brought in a number of younger players and they are exciting.

“But we have got to see it in the flesh and see how they react to different stimulus put in front of them and the more quality and competitiveness put in font of them as well.

“And when we do get back it will be great and everyone is looking forward to getting back,” Leon added.