As the European football season resumes over the weekend after an intense World Cup qualifying campaign break, a host of mouth-watering fixtures are in line to be played over the next few weeks.
One highly anticipated match is Napoli’s Europa League clash against Leicester City at the King Power Stadium in England. Both teams face each other off in the group stages after facing Juventus and Manchester City in their respective league fixtures.
However, the match is set to be controversial due to the UK government’s travel restriction policies. The Premier League released a statement towards the end of August stating that players arriving from 26 red-list countries will have to quarantine for ten days on arrival in the United Kingdom.
The imposed travel restrictions will likely have a major impact on Napoli’s preparations as they currently possess four players as part of the 26 country list. Kalidou Koulibaly (Senegal), David Ospina (Colombia), Victor Osimhen (Nigeria) and Andre-Frank Anguissa (Cameroon) are four integral players of the side who the club cannot afford to lose for a match because of foreign restrictions.
According to this week’s print edition of Il Mattino, the Partenopei are considering to request UEFA to move the mid-week Europa League game to a neutral venue.
The match is scheduled to take place on Thursday evening, September 16, as part of the Group C opener.
Spartak Moscow and Legia Warsaw are the other two teams in the group.