08 Apr Sol Campbell discuss COVID-19 and managing Southend United in new podcast
Southend United manager, Sol Campbell, would like to ‘finish the football season’ but admits he doesn’t know how it will work as “for me it’s the health and containing the health and making sure everyone is ok”. His thoughts all revealed in a new episode of Colin Murray’s 52 podcast series.
Colin Murray’s 52 sponsored by Grosvenor Casinos is a 12-episode podcast series which challenges sporting heroes to a game of ’52’ where every question is left to chance from a unique deck of cards with 52 random questions.
The former England international, whose Southend United team sat second from bottom in League Two before the season was disrupted by COVID-19, faced five questions from the 52 deck with themed rounds including the riffle shuffle, stacked deck and wildcard.
Available on all the usual platforms including iTunes, Spotify and Deezer, the former Arsenal and Tottenham Hotspur defender, features in episode six of the series.
In one of his most revealing interviews in recent times, Campbell discusses the current COVID-19 situation and its impact on the football season after picking the card ‘What’s Next?’.
Campbell said: “It’s really difficult to kind of think you’re going to play the games without anyone [behind closed doors]. You’ve got players who have maybe got it and they don’t know they have got it and then they pass it on, and then they have symptoms and then they go home. Then the other guys get it and then those guys don’t know they got it…and the whole process starts again.
“Who’s got the players and the squad to kind of absorb that all the way down to League Two. It’s difficult, because I want to finish the league. But it’s how we do it.”
After Colin Murray asks when the next season should start, Campbell states there is “no chance until after a break and the season would need to start at the earliest, in the first week of October.”
Campbell also talks about his managerial ambitions and the situation at Southend United. He continued: “For me it’s all about the football. That is the main thing for me. As long as the football [club] is solid and I’ve got people who back me and believe in football and want me to do well and back me, that’s where I want to be.
“As a manager I still want to win and want to work with players and help them get better it doesn’t matter who they are. When you look at the players I have and first got into the club [at Southend United] it wasn’t the best, but we’ve got a great team and we’ve got them better…and I’ve learnt a lot.”
After picking the card ‘Where do you keep your medals or trophies?’, the defender who controversially switched allegiances from the white to the red side of North London in 2001, also reveals that his favourite accolade is lifting the League Cup with Spurs in which he was the first black captain to do so at the old Wembley.
Listen and subscribe to Colin Murray’s 52 sponsored by Grosvenor Casinos with a new episode from former England cricket captain, Michael Vaughan, here.
