Danny Rose reveals what Steve Bruce told him in phone call

Newcastle United's squad started to return to small-group training this afternoon ahead of a proposed restart for the Premier League, suspended since mid-March due to the coronavirus pandemic, next month.

Rose, on loan from Tottenham Hotspur, questioned the timing of the return earlier this month.

And the defender has again spoken about the situation for the The Lockdown Tactics podcast.

"I'm dying to get back to football, but just with the things that are happening right now, people are going through this coronavirus pandemic a lot worse than me, I don't want to be complaining about everything," said the 29-year-old.

"Just off the fact that people are suggesting we should go back to football, like we're guinea pigs or lab rats. We've going to experiment this phase and see if it works or not. I can just imagine people at home saying 'well, they earn that amount of money, so they should be going back'.

"For stuff like that, I think ‘is it worth the hassle?’. I could be potentially risking my health for people's entertainment, and that's not something I want to be involved in if I'm honest."

Steve Bruce, United’s head coach, spoke to Rose about his previous comments.

"I was having my breakfast the next day, and then I saw Steve Bruce coming up on my phone,” said Rose. “So I was like 'oh no!'.

"I let it ring for about 30 seconds, and then I thought ‘I'd better answer this’. So I went in another room and I spoke to him, and he said I just need to word things a bit better if I'm going to do things like that.

"He explained the measures that they're going to do to make things safe. Obviously, I've seen the headlines, and we, as footballers and people in the public, we have a platform."

Rose added: “I know I maybe could have worded what I said a bit better, but six weeks ago (health secretary) Matt Hancock was saying that footballers need to half their wages.

“Now we're needed to hopefully try to entertain people. People need to make their minds up.”