According to the Athletic, Tottenham Hotspur had found a creative way around the red-list country issue but that will only work if the national teams play along.
We have known for a while that Tottenham Hotspur, among other teams, would have a problem with the international breaks and Covid, given the red-list status of all of South America. According to the Athletic, Tottenham Hotspur as well as Aston Villa, has found a little pathway to get their players back as fast and fit as possible. However, after Cristian Romero was absent from the Argentina roster on Thursday, one has to wonder if La Albiceleste is really going to hold up their end. So what is the problem, what is the potential solution, and what may scupper this plan to get the players back to the club as quickly as possible?
Covid, red-list, and a 10-day wait
Most people, a football fan or not, are aware of the challenges of traveling internationally right now. In England that is particularly difficult where the red-list status of many countries forces people to quarantine.
Essentially anyone who has been in red list country within 10 days prior to arrival in the UK must submit themselves to a 10-day quarantine. Making this quarantine more difficult for a professional footballer, people are confined to their hotel rooms at specially identified locations.
Long story short, you are stuck in a box for 10-days, which does not exactly jive with playing 90 minutes of football at the highest level. However, Tottenham and Aston Villa apparently have found the best possible workaround to support the national teams and get their players back as quickly as possible.
What is the Tottenham return plan?
Tottenham and Aston Villa both have been trying to work with the South American national teams to hatch a plan to get their players back as quickly as possible. Emiliano Martinez and Emiliano Buendia of Villa are both in the same boat as Giovani Lo Celso and Cristian Romero with Argentina, while Davinson Sanchez faces similar hurdles with Colombia.
Essentially, the clubs are looking to have a couple of things happen here. The first is that the players would only play in the first two qualifiers and leave World Cup qualifying early. For the Argentinians that would be after facing archrival Brazil but before facing Bolivia at home. For Sanchez, that means facing Paraguay and then not facing Chile.
By leaving after just two matches instead of three, the players would knock at least four days off their potential absence. Both Colombia and Argentina play their third qualifier for this break on Thursday, meaning the players would likely lose at least one if not two extra matches.
Tottenham, Villa get creative with a return plan
So step one is to get the players released early, step two is a bit more creative. Whenever it is that the players leave, they are not going to fly back directly to the UK. If they fly directly to the UK they are stuck in the hotel quarantine which would kill their fitness. Instead, according to The Athletic, the players would be flying to Croatia, which is a country, NOT on the red list.
By staying in Croatia for 10 days, the players would have the freedom to actually train and hopefully not lose all their fitness. Further, if they enter the UK after having not been in a red list country in the previous 10 days, they are then free to join the team and participate as normal – assuming negative Covid tests of course.
This seems like a wonderful plan that helps the countries and helps the clubs both but there may be a snag.
Romero missing Thursday makes one wonder
If the players are indeed able to leave after the Sunday match and enter Croatia on Monday, September 6, they could be integrated back with the team as early as Thursday, September 16, the same day Spurs travel to Rennes and three days before Chelsea. This could mean the players only miss two matches total and only 1 in the Premier League.
However, this plan only works if the players are released by their respective national teams after their second qualifier on Sunday. The idea was that the Premier League players would play Thursday and Sunday and then skip the following Thursday. This is all well and good and seems like a possibility for most of the participants, except Romero did not play on Thursday.
Not only did Cuti Romero not play Thursday against Venezuela, but Romero also was not even in the squad. By missing out entirely on Thursday it makes one wonder if he is going to play the second and third matches instead. If that is the case the plan to get Romero back early, along with Lo Celso and Sanchez may not work for Tottenham.
For Lo Celso, he can actually force the decision by simply picking up a yellow against Brazil, which would mean he was ineligible for the match against Bolivia. Romero is in no such situation and his missing out in game one of the three makes one wonder.
Ultimately, we will find out on Monday who is actually coming home early and who is destined to miss most of September for the club. For the Spurs losing the trio for a couple of matches is not the end of the world, not having them back and available until Arsenal, which would likely be the case with playing all three matches and a full UK quarantine is a different story.