Fabian Schar reveals his 'problem' at Newcastle United this season

Schar had a stop-start campaign for Newcastle United before the coronavirus pandemic saw football stopped indefinitely last month.

The defender was outstanding last season, and was named the North East Football Writers’ Association’s player of the year for 2019. However, Schar, 28, had a frustrating few months before the suspension.

“My problem this season is that I’ve been injured again and again,” Schar told Blick. “I had an inner ligament injury in October. I’ve had the complaints for a long time, but I still played. In retrospect, it would have been better to say earlier that it was no longer possible to play and paused.

“I suffered a muscle injury in early January. After that, it was difficult to get back into the team.

“We have six central defenders in the squad. Now we play with a four-man defence. That means four are sitting on the bench. So I can already say the last one or two months have certainly not been as I had imagined.”

Schar and his team-mates are waiting to find out if the Premier League season can be concluded behind closed doors.

“Of course, it’s not at all what you would imagine as a footballer,” said Schar. “And it’s hard for me to imagine that it (games without fans) could be a solution. It won’t make anyone happy – neither the players nor the clubs nor the fans.

“Basically, you should definitely play the season to the end. For many clubs, the stakes are high.”