Stuart Dallas: Leeds and NI player on suffering bereavement when hit by Covid

Leeds and Northern Ireland player Stuart Dallas has said that the death of a close friend and contracting Covid-19 at the same time in September "impacted on me a lot".

Dallas, 30, pulled out of the Northern Ireland squad for their World Cup qualifiers in early September.

At the time, the Leeds man's absence was attributed to personal reasons but he has now elaborated on the issue.

"It's been a challenging couple of months," he told BBC Radio Leeds.

"I lost one of my best pals, one of my closest friends back during the international break in September. I had Covid in among that as well. It's been a difficult time.

"Thankfully I have a good family, my wife and kids around me and good team-mates and a good club to help me through these challenging times.

"It's part and parcel of life. Everybody goes through these [difficult times]. I've just got to crack on."

Dallas couldn't attend friend's funeral

As well as missing Northern Ireland's qualifiers against Lithuania and Switzerland plus the friendly in Estonia, Dallas' Covid diagnosis meant that he was unable to attend the funeral of his close friend which made the situation "even more difficult".

"I was in an hotel and locked away from everybody which I found very challenging. It was tough, I'm not going to lie. It was really hard," Dallas said.

Dallas recovered to return to Leeds duty but admitted that the events of September took a mental and physical toll.

"Of course it has affected me because in football you don't get time to grieve when something like that happens.

"We're here to do a job. I represent a lot of people when I play for this football club and I don't want to let anybody down so it's important that I continue to crack on and play through it."

Leeds have not so far hit the heights of last season as they sit 17th in the Premier League after nine games but Dallas says he will "not shy away from any challenge no matter what's affecting me personally".

"I'll just crack on and maybe look back on it in years to come that it was maybe the wrong thing to do.

"For me at the minute, I feel it's the right thing, to not use anything as an excuse.

"I set myself very high standards especially with the standards I set last year. I know this year I just haven't touched them yet."

The county Tyrone man does believe that the effects of Covid have affected his energy levels since his return although he is loath to use that as any excuse.

"I wasn't suffering from any symptoms but looking back it definitely took from my energy levels and hopefully I'm over the worst of it now.

"My game is based a lot on getting up and down the pitch. I think that has affected me [but] I felt in the last couple of games and certainly in the Wolves game that I was getting back to myself," added Dallas, whose 240 Leeds appearances make him the most experienced member of the club's current squad.