Jonathan Woodgate reveals Riverside plans as Middlesbrough step up training

The Boro boss has also revealed the squad will take part in some training sessions at the Riverside ahead of playing behind-closed-doors games there when the action returns.

The EFL announced on Sunday its provisional plan to resume on June 20, in line with the Premier League 2019-20 season also restarting, following 11 weeks without football as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.

“That’s the news we’ve been waiting for,” said Woodgate.

“As a club we’ve made no secret of the fact that we wanted to restart the season when it is deemed safe enough to do so.

“We’ve followed the guidance of the authorities all along, and will continue to do so.”

Boro, 19th and two points above the drop zone, and their Championship rivals have less than three weeks to prepare for a return to competitive action.

The squad returned to small group training at Rockliffe last week and will resume contact training later this week.

Woodgate added: “It isn’t a lot of time, but the players worked to their own programmes during lockdown, and came back here last week.

“We’d had June 20 in mind as a possible to return and were already working towards that date.

“We had a good week last week and we’ll step things up this week, and keep moving forwards now.”

Boro, who have four home games still to play, will also use the Riverside Stadium as part of the preparations. There will be no fans inside stadiums for the foreseeable future.

“It’s important that we get back there,” he added.

“We’ll do most of our work at Rockliffe, but we will use the Riverside just to get the feel of the place again.

“It’ll be a different environment without our supporters, but it is what it is, and safety has to come first.

“We have four home games left and we will have to adapt to that.”