South Korea’s clash with Qatar in doubt due to Covid-19

Nov 16, 2020 06:00 am

Six South Korea players and a member of the team's staff tested positive for Covid-19 before their 3-2 defeat by Mexico in a friendly yesterday morning (Singapore time), casting doubts over their clash with Qatar tomorrow.

Yonhap News Agency reported that South Korea were initially informed of four players and one staff member testing positive around 20 hours before they began their first international match of the year in Wiener Neustadt, Austria.

A retest of players who tested negative returned two more positives and the match was played only after discussions with the Mexican Football Federation and the Austrian Football Association.

The Korea Football Association said in a statement that a game could go ahead as long as a team has 13 healthy players with at least one goalkeeper, Yonhap reported, adding South Korea had 19 players including two goalkeepers available.

The initial four players who tested positive were Kwon Chang-hoon, Hwang In-beom, Lee Dong-jun and Jo Hyeon-woo, with Kim Moon-hwan and Na Sang-ho joining them on the list later.

All the players and the member of staff will have to spend 10 days in quarantine in Austria. - REUTERS