For days on end, the manicured lawns at Bayern Munich's training ground lay empty. Not a ball in sight, not a Qatar Airways-branded tracksuit to be seen. Even the quirky chap who regularly dresses up in full Bayern gear to train alongside his heroes at the edge of the grounds was gone - a victim, like everyone else, to the restraints of life under coronavirus.

And then, all of a sudden, they were back. Only in staggered groups of five and at a safe distance from one another, but back nonetheless. Manuel Neuer with Sven Ulreich; Thomas Muller with Jerome Boateng, David Alaba with Serge Gnabry.

Bayern are not the only ones. While the rest of the sports world remains largely in lockdown, the majority of Bundesliga clubs resumed training this week, albeit under strict regulations. No handshakes, no hugs and, as Borussia Dortmund rushed to assure everyone, 'no tackling'.

Bayern Munich players have returned to training amid the ongoing coronavirus pandemic

The media keep a safe distance apart as they watch on as Bayern get back to work

Erling Haaland and his Borussia Dortmund team-mates have also returned to the pitch

'It's better than training alone at home, but it's nothing like normality,' said Wolfsburg's Maxi Arnold. Yet who is to say what is normal anymore? Indeed, as training resumes and the German Football League (DFL) eyes a league restart next month, some are beginning to wonder whether football has lost its marbles.

Until now, the DFL and Germany's top clubs have handled this crisis rather well. Players have agreed wage cuts without the moralising and melodrama seen in Spain and England, while the top four clubs quickly agreed to provide financial support to struggling rivals. The league, meanwhile, has followed the example of politicians, putting the season on hold for weeks at a time and waiting to see how the situation develops.

Yet the first cracks are now beginning to emerge. At a press conference last week, the DFL outlined their plan to keep the season on hold until April 30, but allow clubs to resume training from April 5. Aside from the obvious health concerns, the timetable has left some clubs feeling disadvantaged.

Under Germany's federal system, the ultimate decision to allow training or not lies with the regional health authorities. That means that while Bayern, Dortmund and countless others are back on the training pitch, Werder Bremen are still stuck indoors.

Relegation-threatened Werder Bremen are still stuck indoors due to the coronavirus outbreak

For a club like Bremen, who were already hurtling towards relegation when the season was cut short, that feels like a gross injustice. And though the DFL called on clubs to stand together last week, squabbles have already broken out elsewhere over who is training and who isn't.

Training may yet be the least of the league's worries. With TV revenues not insured and no billionaire foreign investors to fall back on, around half of Bundesliga clubs are reportedly facing insolvency if the season is cancelled.

Cancellation would be a 'disaster' RB Leipzig sporting director Oliver Mintzlaff told Bild this week, warning it would lead to a 'new, shocking Bundesliga' with 'fewer clubs'.

Faced with that unhappy prospect, the DFL are now determined to finish the season by June 30, when the TV contracts enter their next phase. The logic is that, even with no fans and strict medical controls, finishing the campaign is worth it to protect football financially. As league CEO Christian Seifert has repeatedly pointed out, tens of thousands of jobs are on the line.

RB Leipzig's sporting director claimed cancelling Bundesliga this season would be a 'disaster'

The DFL are eager to finish the season by June 30 but the plan has raised plenty of eyebrows

Even so, the current plan has raised plenty of eyebrows. To finish by the end of June, the games are reportedly to be played behind closed doors from the first or second weekend of May. That is weeks before what many had thought realistic, and months before events such as Wimbledon and the Olympics, which have already been postponed or cancelled.

When the crisis first hit, supporter association 'Unsere Kurve' urged the league to avoid playing behind closed doors, arguing that football could not 'live in an alternative reality' while the rest of society shut down. While opinions on so-called 'ghost games' have since softened, the latest plan has fed suspicions that football is losing touch with reality.

The DFL's current plan would not only require approval from all the regional authorities, it would also need an immense medical operation to prevent the virus from rampaging through the playing corps. After all, you can ban hugs and tackling in training sessions, but actual games are another thing entirely.

German football is slipping into dangerous pomposity amid the critical issues the world faces

According to one report, the latest idea is to arrange tests every three days for active players, to ensure that any outbreak is nipped in the bud early on. At a time when the whole world is scrapping over limited medical resources, such suggestions have left many people shaking their heads.

'We are almost at our limits in terms of lab capacities in Germany,' virologist Ulf Dittmer told WAZ newspaper. 'I don't know which lab would make itself available to test healthy Bundesliga players when we urgently need these tests for people who are seriously ill.'

He has a point, and there are plenty of others who question whether German football, so pragmatic and humble just a few weeks ago, is now slipping into dangerous pomposity.

'Stop thinking yourselves are so important!' cried Der Spiegel's sports correspondent last week. They are words which the DFL might want to heed ahead of their next meeting on April 17. If common sense prevails, there may yet be a revised plan, and those manicured lawns in Munich will be empty once again.