DANIEL PARSLOW is adamant his benefit year dinner is just “postponed, not cancelled” - even though the exact rearranged date is uncertain for now.

The former York City defender was granted a benefit year by the club thanks to his 12 years of service to the Minstermen, and as part of the festivities, he had a dinner for Thursday evening.

But with the spread of coronavirus, Parslow - like huge swathes of professional, part-time and amateur sport - has had to put the plans on the back-burner for the time being.

He is hopeful of getting things back on track for autumn, though that is contingent on how the national response to Covid-19 progresses.

“With everything that’s going on,” he said. “In recent weeks it looked uneasy.

“Having discussions with the organising committee, we were edging that way anyway, then when the Prime Minister announced the guidelines, there was no question.

“It’s postponed, not cancelled.

“I know a lot of preparations have gone into the 26th of March and it will still happen.

“We’re working hard with the racecourse but, like everyone else, we don’t know how long the pandemic will go on for. We’re hoping September, October time we’ll be back to normal.

“The response to ticket sales has been fantastic. We had to notify people with the date in their diaries (about the postponement). They were all very understanding.”

Dinner ticket-holders can expect to be treated to a welcome drink, a three-course meal and an evening of reminiscing with Parslow's former team-mates, including a look back at the 2012 promotion season's ‘Wembley twice in a week’ achievement and archive footage of his career.

The 34-year-old also unveiled prospective plans for another quiz night following the success of the last, a football quiz held at Acomb Conservative Club in January, and said he is holding out hope that other events will not have to be rescheduled so much.

He added: "The response to the quiz night in Acomb was fantastic, and off the back of that there are plans to squeeze another in. That's still to be confirmed but we'd like to do another before the year is up.

"The golf day is still in for July 23rd, and the dinner will follow that. Everything's been pushed back a bit. I'm hoping the golf day will not have to be moved.

"As far as other events go, we had nothing else imminent so there's not been too much disruption."

In the meantime, Parslow says he is going about his business in much the same way as the rest of the country.

"I'm taking precautions," he said.

"The advice is to work from home if you can so I've got my laptop and phone here and I'm doing what I can do.

"It's hard not seeing friends and family but everyone's aware of how serious this is so it's a case of hunkering down and hoping we get through it without too many being affected.

"We've seen what's going on in Europe. If everyone plays their part, hopefully we can stop the virus spreading."