Four Real Madrid players, Thibaut Courtois, Federico Valverde, Eduardo Camavinga and Vinicius Junior, and three others from FC Barcelona, Ousmane Dembélé, Samuel Umtiti and Gavi, are positive for Covid-19, the two Spanish clubs announced on Wednesday (December 29th).
“Our players Courtois, Valverde, Camavinga and Vinicius Jr. have tested positive for Covid-19“, said Real Madrid in a terse statement.
Comunicado Oficial. #Real Madrid
– Real Madrid CF (@realmadrid) December 29, 2021
The Madrid club, which must play Sunday against Getafe for the resumption of La Liga after the Christmas break, did not wish to communicate on the number of players currently in isolation while since mid-December, eight others players on the team had tested positive for Covid-19, including Luka Modric, Gareth Bale and David Alaba.
Likewise, FC Barcelona announced that “Ousmane Dembélé, Samuel Umtiti and Gavi presented positive PCR tests for Covid-19 during checks carried out within the workforce“Bringing the number of infected players on the team to six, in full swing due to the Omicron variant.”The players are doing well and are in isolation at home“, said Barça in his press release.
[COMUNICADO MÉDICO]
Los jugadores O. Dembélé, Umtiti y Gavi han dado positivo por Covid-19 en las pruebas PCR realizadas a la plantilla. Los jugadores are encuentran well of salud y están aislados en su domicilio. El Club ha informado a las autoridades competentes pic.twitter.com/eIY1JLAopR
– FC Barcelona (@FCBarcelona_es) December 29, 2021
The two French players and the Spanish midfielder of the Catalan club are thus added to Jordi Alba, Daniel Alves and Clément Lenglet, bringing to six the number of positive players and therefore unavailable within the team coached by Xavi Hernandez before the La Liga meeting on Sunday against RDC Mallorca.
A match must be postponed or canceled if one of the teams does not have at least 13 capable players, including a minimum of five from the first team, according to the criteria established by the Spanish Football Federation and La Liga.
The meeting scheduled for Sunday between Atlético de Madrid and Rayo Vallecano could therefore be threatened, while the latter would have 17 positive players in its workforce according to the local press, which would make it the Spanish first division club most affected by this wave of contamination. Among the other La Liga residents affected, Real Sociedad announced that they had ten infected players. Cadiz has five and Mallorca four.