Coronavirus: how it may impact Portsmouth Academy's next intake of scholars

The youth chief revealed the Blues have various plans being reviewed weekly in place as current players undergo their own training regime.

Schools in England will now be closed from Friday until further notice because of the Covid-19 pandemic, meaning GCSEs are now cancelled.

Pompey usually announce which youngster have signed two-year apprenticeships around the start of July ahead of pre-season.

But that may now have to change as the Blues map out potential strategies.

Kelly said: ‘We’re the same as the first team. It’s geared towards April 3 (when elite football is suspended until) so our lads are off at this moment in time.

‘We're on a week-to-week review so we’ll schedule it and look to see what's going on.

‘The staff are in and funnily enough it gives us time to do some planning for things such as pre-season.

‘It gives us a little bit of acceleration on planning and we’ll review it week to week.

‘Of course it’s difficult and there’s a Plan A and a Plan B for when the season will finish.

‘You can't gear around a specific date but football is going to start again at some point and we’ve got to be ready for when it does.

‘Schools might have to hold GCSEs in September and that impacts us in terms of the new first-year scholars and when they’ll start.

‘We’re into a lot of formative planning around that really.’

Uefa hope for European leagues’ seasons to be completed by June 30.

However, that’s only for senior football and Kelly's unsure whether the academy’s Merit League One campaign will finish this season.

He added: ‘We're all on this April 3 review so we’ll work towards that and see where it goes.

‘Whether they deem it essential or non-essential for youth development long-term will be the key area.

‘I’m talking to the Football League quite a lot so it’ll be the Football League, Premier League and us getting around the table.

‘We can only go on what the review is. The lads of got their training schedules and programmes so we’ll do as much as we can do.’