Bundesliga will be back in action this month, and it is something that Yussuf Poulsen has been waiting for, after staying at home for two months without football.
The 25-year-old forward is enjoying a great season with RB Leipzig, and he hopes he can return to the top form once again.
“It’s a good feeling. Everybody in the team loves to play football, that’s no different to any other teams. “We’re only happy when we’re out on the pitch!
“It’s really good to get started again and to play with a ball – that’s what we live for. It’s not quite normal, it’s not the same as if everybody was training together, hopefully that will change soon. We hear about them coming to an agreement about when we can start training as a team. Everybody is looking forward to that moment.”
However, Poulsen admitted that without fans in a stadium during the Bundesliga game, it will actually affect players more than anyone can imagine.
“I don’t know how many players have played in an empty stadium, that will be the most challenging.
“You normally get a boost from the fans and the atmosphere in the stadium, you now have to find that on your own. That’s going to be a big challenge for many players.
“You’re still setting up for an important game but it will feel a bit like a training game or a friendly. I think that will be the biggest challenge for a lot of players.”
Despite the COVID-19 outbreak have forced Bundesliga to postpone for a while, it was a blessing in disguise for Poulsen.
“I spend a lot of time with my 6- month-old kid, it has been nice to spend some time with him.
“I was doing a lot of travelling before the outbreak so it has been nice over the last few weeks to be able to wake up with him every morning and we could be together as a family.
“We don’t usually get this amount of family time. I’ve made the best of the situation.”
The league postponement and Germany lockdown measures meant Poulsen can’t go back to his home country Denmark. That’s when he decided to keep in touch of his family through online.
“We have a lot of video conference calls. We made a deal to try and eat at the same time so we can use our laptops or iPads and have a conference call when we’re eating.
“Everybody can talk then, my sister is in her home, my grandmother in hers, my uncle in his, it’s quite nice. We’ve tried it a couple of times. It’s different but it works quite well.
“We live in two different countries and each country has different ways of dealing with the crisis so that’s been a big topic. You can now go to the shops in Germany with a mask on, that’s not the case in Denmark so we’re keeping each other updated on what’s going on. Hopefully I can also go back to Denmark soon so it’s good to know what to expect when I go back there.”
Poulsen also revealed during his spare time at home, he started to learn a new language.
“I’ve started learning French. I’m not that good yet but now I’ve started training I can speak to some of my French-speaking teammates. I can also juggle with tennis balls, I’ve got a lot better at that. I’ve learned to sing kinds’ songs, that’s one of my new-found talents! I’m going to keep that just for my son though, he’s not as judgmental as everyone else!”
The resumption of Bundesliga put pressure on players including Poulsen to keep fit and prepare for the upcoming match.
“Getting fit and staying fit. Touching the ball as much as possible. It has to be fun as well because it’s a difficult time for everybody at the moment. We can’t fully do the work we used to do because there’s no games. We have to mentally prepare ourselves as if it was an extra pre-season and stay focussed on getting fit and getting ready for whenever we can start again.”
RB Leipzig leading Bundesliga for the first half of the season, and Poulsen believes the success owes to the squad depth.
“We have quality. We are a good team with a lot of quality. We have such an even team – we have a squad of 24 players and I think everyone has started at least once.
“That’s not always the case to have so many players with the quality to play from the start. That’s why I think we are going to be dangerous in the league.
“If other teams have injuries or suspensions they are going to have problems, whereas we can just replace them with the next player. We have so much quality in the group it doesn’t matter if two or three players are injured, we still have enough quality to keep going.”
Despite the early optimism, Leipzig suffered from a loss of form and currently sit third in the league behind Bayern dan Borussia Dortmund. But Poulsen believes his team can turn things around.
“It’s been a great season so far. We’re in the top four coming into the last nine games. We are still in the Champions League, we got knocked out of the cup unfortunately, that’s maybe the only down side of the season so far.
“We set ourselves some goals for the season – to get through the group stage of the Champions League, to be in the top three of the Bundesliga. We’re heading in the right direction to achieve that goal, we’ve already achieved some of them and now we just hope we can get started again so we can finish off a great season.”
While many countries including Germany are still recovering from the COVID-19, Poulsen hopes the crisis will end and people can return to their normal life.
“For me the most important thing is not RB Leipzig or the Bundesliga, it’s everybody in the world. What I wish is just to get through this crisis with a little pain as possible. It has been very painful already for a lot of families so I hope as few people as possible get infected and die from the virus. Hopefully we can get over this crisis as soon as possible.”