THISWAS MADNESS

‘Crazy to let Atletico fans travel to England’ says legend Maldini

ITALY legend Paolo Maldini has slammed the decision to allow Atletico Madrid to travel to Liverpool in the Champions League as “madness”.

Former AC Milan star Maldini, now a director at the Serie A giants, is currently recovering from coronavirus.

And he is astounded Liverpool’s

3-2 defeat at

Anfield, played in front of more than 52,000 fans on March 11, was allowed to take place, with Spain, and Madrid in particular, an infection hotspot.

“Playing Liverpool v Atletico with open doors, with four thousand Madrid fans in the stands, when it was already known that in Madrid there was an outbreak, was madness,” he said.

The match was Liverpool’s last before football was suspended around the world.

Maldini (below), 51, also pointed to problems caused by playing Atalanta v Valencia a month earlier.

More than 45,000 fans were at the San Siro game – now called “Match Zero” for the impact it had in spreading the virus – on February 19, two days before Italy’s first official Covid-19 cases.

It has since been blamed for infection rates accelerating in both Italy and Spain.

Maldini said: “When Atalanta v Valencia was played, the alarm had not gone off, but we know that evening is one of the causes of the outbreak.

“In football, it is impossible not only to play, but also to train without contact. It is right to put all the teams on the same level. We must not be in a hurry, it does not take just two days to recover from this virus.”

On his own recovery, Maldini said: “I feel pretty well now, the worst is over. I still have a little dry cough and I have lost my sense of taste and smell – we hope they return.

“The pains are particularly severe – you feel a squeeze in the chest, pain in joints and muscles. It’s a new virus. The physicist fights against an enemy he does not know.”

His 18-year-old son Daniel has also been struck down and Maldini said: “He has pain and fever, but he is young. He had it in a lighter form.”