Premier League footballers won’t be exempt from quarantine after some internationals

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Premier League footballers selected for World Cup qualifiers in Portugal or South America will be forced to quarantine for 10 days when they return to England, with no exemptions, according to new Government rules.

The Department for Transport updated its travel guidance, which states that exemptions for elite sports people do not apply for countries where travel to the UK is currently banned.

And today, Home Secretary Priti Patel added these destinations to a ‘red list’ of Covid countries. UK residents returning high risk areas must quarantine in a hotel for 10 days at their own expense.

These moves will essentially mean players and clubs must choose between club and country. And it has led to urgent discussions between government and football’s governing bodies as they calculate the implications.

A taskforce of officials from the Departments of Health and Transport as well as the Department for Culture Media and Sport are urgently assessing the consequences for Arsenal’s Europa League Round of 32 fixture away to Benfica and the March internationals.

The DfT’s banned list of countries and the Home Secretary’s ‘red list’ includes, Portugal and South American nations, like Argentina, Uruguay Brazil, Colombia and Paraguay. The Home Secretary’s list also includes countries in southern Africa.

There are currently 56 players from these countries plying their trade in the Premier League, of whom 41 have been capped since 2018.

If selected and they chose to travel home for international matches, players would then be unavailable for their clubs for 10 days.

In all, 12 Premier League clubs have players who may expect to take part in World Cup qualifiers, which would be affected by the new travel restrictions.

The club with the most affected internationals is likely to be Manchester City with seven, followed by Wolves with six, Everton with five and Liverpool and Tottenham with four (see the table below). 

The countries selected for travel bans and quarantine have been chosen because of dangerous variants that have emerged there – or because they have rocketing infection and death rates. 

Making the case for the government in a Commons statement, Ms Patel said: ‘It is clear that there are still too many people coming in and out of our country each day.

‘And today I am announcing further action to strengthen the health measures we already have at the border, but to reduce passenger flow so that only a small number of people for whom it is absolutely essential to travel are doing so and therefore reducing the risk to our world-leading vaccine programme.’ 

The absence of exemptions for elite sports people travelling to banned countries initially emerged in government guidance posted at gov.uk.

It states, ‘exemptions are not valid for countries from where travel to the UK is currently banned’, above a list of exemptions, including elite sport.

A Whitehall official confirmed to Sportsmail that the exemption for sport does not apply for banned countries.

It remains to be seen if footballers will be forced to quarantine in hotels with everyone else, should they travel for the matches. 

Officials, governing bodies, as well as clubs and players, only have weeks to resolve the potential crisis.

Arsenal are still in talks about playing the first leg of their Europa League last-32 game against Benfica, which is based in Lisbon in Portugal, next month at a neutral venue, although the Portuguese team object to this.

Under the rules as they now stand, if the Gunners’ squad were to fulfil the fixture in Lisbon, they would be out of action until February 28.

During the period of potential quarantine, Arsenal are due to play at home to Manchester City on Sunday February 21, host Benfica in the Europa League second leg on Thursday February 25 and play away at Leicester City on Saturday February 27.

International matches pose a huge challenge, too, when they resume in March, with a round of World Cup qualifiers in Europe and South America.

Portugal are due to play at home to Azerbaijan on Wednesday March 24.

There are 18 Portuguese players currently operating in the Premier League and 10 of them were in the country’s matchday squad in their last game, away to Croatia in November.

Meanwhile, in South America, Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, Colombia and Brazil all have two games each on Thursday March 25 and Tuesday March 30.

Some 38 players from these countries play in the Premier League.