Four Argentine players may not play on the field for today’s noon match against the Brazilian national football team, in the World Cup qualifiers in Qatar. They are Depo Martinez and Emiliano Buendia, both from Aston Villa, from England, and Cutie Romero and Gio Lo Celso, from Tottenham, also from England.
To enter the country, they lied to Anfisa. They said that over the past two weeks they had not visited any of the four countries where Brazil has travel restrictions: the United Kingdom, South Africa, Northern Ireland and India. But the four athletes’ passports show they were in England until last weekend, when they boarded a flight to Caracas, Venezuela, and from there, to Sao Paulo.
According to Anvisa, in addition to omitting this information in the official health statement, players did not submit a mandatory pre-flight RT-PCR test.
After meeting with representatives of the Ministry of Health and coordinating disease control with the Department of Health of the State of São Paulo, Anfisa reported the truth to the Federal Police. The regulatory agency asked the four players to immediately comply with the 14-day quarantine, not to take part in any activity and to leave Brazilian territory as soon as possible.
Also according to Anvisa, the health risk status is serious.
CONMEBOL, the South American Football Confederation, which organizes World Cup qualifiers, has not yet officially commented on the issue.
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