Inter defender Diego Godin discussed the Coronavirus emergency, its effect on Italy and the postponement of the league in an interview with International media outlet ESPN earlier today.
First, he discussed how the players were forced to continue playing for as long as possible.
“We were exposed until the last moment, they kept pulling the rope to see if we could continue playing, until the situation became untenable. And today we are experiencing a difficult moment.”
The former Atletico Madrid defender then touched on the Coronavirus’ devastating effect on the Italian health care system.
“The health care system has collapsed, there are no intensive care beds to take care of so many seriously ill people and others who may have another disease they cannot cure. There are not so many professional doctors, it’s a very difficult situation.”
The Uruguayan veteran also spoke about how the Nerazzurri were forced to play Juventus behind closed doors in Turin.
“The team continued to train normally, even playing behind closed doors. Just on March 8, Inter played their last match against Juventus, a team that within five days would confirm the first positive case for Coronavirus, Daniele Rugani. At that point we and the Juventus players were quarantined. There the league stopped, but first we continued to play behind closed doors. Surely there were other potentially infected players in that game, so they directly quarantined all of us.”
Godin discussed how the Italian government’s slow response made the situation much worse.
“At first it wasn’t given much importance, it was thought to be a Chinese problem and that it wouldn’t reach other countries. They took the measures little by little, rather slowly. They warned us about what was happening, but at government level no drastic measures were taken to prevent what could have happened.”
Finally, Godin highlighted the heroes of today, the doctors and nurses treating those infected with the contagion.
“The effort that doctors and people in the health service are doing is impressive, everything that can be paid to these people is not up to scratch. Today they are really heroes, you have to see the images of what they do, it’s really moving.”
Godin has returned to his native country after finishing the mandatory two-week isolation period. The 34-year-old defender, who is contracted to the Nerazzurri until 2022, has made 25 appearances across all competitions so far this season under coach Antonio Conte.
