Coronavirus: Gary Neville urges footballers to help their communities during pandemic

Neville and Ryan Giggs have temporarily closed the two Manchester hotels they own, allowing NHS staff free access to the rooms to sleep amid the coronavirus pandemic

Gary Neville has urged professional footballers to help their communities through the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, expressing his confidence that most will want to “do something special”.

Neville and Ryan Giggs have temporarily closed the two Manchester hotels they own, allowing NHS staff free access to the rooms to sleep amid the coronavirus pandemic.

The pair have Hotel Football at Old Trafford and the Stock Exchange Hotel in Manchester city centre so that healthcare workers, who have been put under strain by the outbreak of Covid-19, can use the spaces to rest between shifts.

Neville and Giggs have said they will not make any staff redundant or place them on unpaid leave for the duration of the hotels’ closure.

And, in an interview with the Daily Mail, Neville urged professional footballers to join the community effort in suppressing the global pandemic.

Gary Neville has urged footballers to help (Getty)

“Yeah, I have great faith in football players in terms of their souls,’ he said. ‘I really believe 99 per cent of them are really good human beings who will want to not only look after themselves but also the communities they are part of.

“Most come from the kind of communities that find times like this the most challenging. I do believe players will step up in the next month. Some already have.

“They won’t be selfish. They will want to do something special in the next few weeks, once they have worked out what it is. Sometimes the best help may be to social-distance and stay in their home.

“What can they do outside of that to bring value to the community to help people and the services cope with the challenges they face?”

The UK death toll from coronavirus rose on Tuesday by 87 to a total of 422, according to the government.

There were also more than 1,400 new confirmed cases of the illness as of 9am on Tuesday, bringing the total to 8,077.