COVID-19: Premier League confirms two more positive cases

Sports, PremierLeague, CoronavirusPandemic, COVID19,Football, Italian Football Federation, English Premier League

LONDON: The English Premier League confirmed that two more positive cases of COVID-19 were tested in the second round of testing. The Premier League said that 996 players and club staff were tested for COVID-19 on Tuesday, Thursday and Friday. “Of these, two have tested positive from two clubs,” Premier League said in a statement.

The Premier League clubs have been allowed to start small-group training from Tuesday after the top flight football league in England was suspended on March 13 due to coronavirus outbreak.

In the first round of testing, 748 players and club staff were tested on May 17-18, with six testing positive from three clubs. There were as many as six positive tests for coronavirus across three Premier League clubs on Sunday and Monday, the league had earlier said in a statement on their official website.

The league plans to restart in June after games were stopped due to the global pandemic. The German Bundesliga returned to action after a 65-day break due to the pandemic last week. Spanish LaLiga is also aiming a mid-June return.

Meanwhile, the Italian Football Federation (FIGC) has confirmed that all its competitions, including Serie A, have been further suspended until June 14 amid the global pandemic.

The Serie A is one of the leagues in Europe that did not announce a premature end to the season. The French Ligue 1 thus far remains the only one among the continent’s top five leagues to have done so with PSG declared champions.