34 Football Players Test Positive for COVID-19 in Peru

At least 34 football players have tested positive upon their return to training. In the past week, two teams, Binacional and Sport Huancayo, have been most affected, with nearly a dozen players infected.

Just two days before playing against Alianza Lima, nine players from Binacional have tested positive for COVID-19, according to local media reports. This raises doubts about the effectiveness and compliance with the safety and prevention protocols established for the return of football.

For Johnny Baldovino, legal advisor of the Professional Football Association of Peru (Safap), this outbreak may have occurred during Binacional's trip to Lima, where all teams will be centralized to play the remaining 200 matches of the season.

Instead of traveling by air, Binacional traveled to the Peruvian capital by road, with a 30-hour bus journey from the Andean city of Juliaca, where it is speculated that there may have been an infected person on board.

The protocols required players to undergo testing before departure, but Binacional conducted the tests midway through the journey, during a stop in the city of Arequipa. "Some players came in their own vehicles, making stops alongside the club's bus. They have not been affected," Baldovino explained to Depor newspaper.

"Among those who have tested positive, there are two players who had already had COVID-19 and were in quarantine days ago. What the doctor mentioned to them is that they may still have a certain viral load, although this does not mean that there is a possibility of infecting others," he added.

Once in Lima, at least four Binacional players broke the protocols by going to have lunch at a cevichería, where apparently there were players from other teams in the league.

This situation led to tests being conducted on the Poderoso del Sur team, which revealed the infection focus within the blue squad.

Binacional will face Alianza Lima in a match that will recreate last year's league final, which gave the team from Lake Titicaca their first title in history. Chilean forward Patricio Rubio may make his debut for the Lima team after completing all the necessary paperwork for his signing.

Sport Huancayo will have to face UTC on Saturday with only 16 players, including 3 goalkeepers, as 9 of their players are still in quarantine since last week after testing positive for COVID-19.

The Huancayo team has been unable to train for a week since the alarm was raised upon detecting the new cases just as they were about to travel to Lima.

"There are a series of factors that will not allow us to arrive in the best conditions, but we will appeal to the will and desire of the players who are in good health," commented Huancayo coach Wilmar Valencia on Radio Unión.

"I am very worried because this is a health issue. The guys have strength, but not everyone is the same age and not everyone has the same strength. I have relatives who have died in this pandemic, and it is a very big concern," said the 58-year-old coach.

Amidst this situation, professional football will resume with the match scheduled for Friday between Universitario and Cantolao, two of the teams that returned to training first last July.

Both Universitario and Sport Boys will return to the competition with one point less than what the Peruvian Football Federation (FPF) deducted from them for not meeting certain payment deadlines.

The league will resume from the seventh round of the Apertura Tournament, with thirteen matchdays remaining to then play the Clausura in two groups of ten teams each, and later the semifinals and final for the national title.

Although the government gave the green light for the return of professional football at the end of May, the competition's comeback coincides with the worst moment of the pandemic in the country, with a resurgence of infections.

On Wednesday, records were broken with almost 8,000 new cases and 221 deaths in a single day. The accumulated cases rise to 447,000, of which nearly 121,000 are active, the highest figure since the beginning of the emergency.