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Aston Villa will line up a youth team in their FA Cup clash with Liverpool after the coronavirus swept through the senior team.
No first-team player will participate in the third-round game at Villa Park and boss Dean Smith will not lead the team on Friday, it is understood.
Attendees John Terry, Craig Shakespeare and Richard O’Kelly will also not be at the party, with no senior bubble individuals involved.
U-23 coach Mark Delaney, who played for Villa from 1999-2007, will take on the squad that will be made up of U-18 and U-23 players.
Youth teams and staff have been tested but should be negative when results are released on Friday.
The youngsters train in a different area than the first team at Bodymoor Heath, so they have not come into contact with them, but if there is more positive evidence, the game will almost certainly be suspended.
Villa was forced to close the training ground today after confirming that a large number of players and staff had contracted Covid-19.
Defender Jake Walker has been pulled from his loan at Alvechurch, which plays in the Premier League South Central, to underscore the numbers and players Villa needs on Friday.
The club, the Football Association and the Premier League held talks on Thursday and confirmed that they were trying to start the game.
The FA said in a statement on Twitter: “The @FA and @AVFCOfficial are working closely together to try to ensure that the club’s #EmiratesFACup third round tie with @LFC can continue as planned at Villa Park tomorrow morning. night.
“Final confirmation will be made tomorrow pending the results of additional Covid-19 tests.”
Derby also made the decision to bring their youth team to Chorley for their FA Cup tie on Saturday after major cases within their first-team bubble, but Shrewsbury’s game in Southampton was canceled after an outbreak at the club. Sky Bet League One.
Although in extremely different circumstances, the game bears similarities to last season’s Carabao Cup quarter-finals between the teams in December 2019.
Liverpool eliminated a youth team after their senior team traveled to Doha for the Club World Cup and Villa won 5-0.
It came after Southampton’s third round draw against Shrewsbury was canceled due to an outbreak at club Sky Bet League One.
The match was due to take place on Saturday, but several players and Shrewsbury staff members tested positive for Covid-19.
The Football Association Professional Game Board will meet early next week to decide what will happen to the match.
Shrewsbury said they had “reluctantly” advised the FA that they would not be able to comply with the match after medical council said it would not be safe for the match to take place.
The League One club has been unable to train since last week and has closed its Sundorne Castle training ground for 10 days.
Southampton had their own concerns last week after goalkeeper Alex McCarthy tested positive for coronavirus and had to miss his team’s win over Liverpool.
Elsewhere, Middlesbrough has seen its preparations for its game at Brentford interrupted by a series of positive tests.
The Sky Bet Championship club, whose manager Neil Warnock tested positive last year, effectively closed its Rockliffe Park training venue on Monday.
The move came after positive cases were confirmed among first-team players and staff.
A new round of testing, which also included players under the age of 23, took place on Thursday morning and the results are expected before the weekend.
Wayne Rooney and the entire Derby first-team squad will miss the third-round tie in Lancashire, and Pearce revealed that nine players and staff within that bubble tested positive for Covid-19.
Meanwhile, in the Women’s Super League the matches between Manchester City and West Ham and Arsenal and Aston Villa were suspended after positive tests.
Meanwhile, Fulham boss Scott Parker called Aleksandar Mitrovic’s violation of the Covid-19 rule “not acceptable.”
Cottagers forward Mitrovic was one of the high-profile players to break coronavirus restrictions during the holiday period when he was photographed with Crystal Palace captain Luka Milivojevic on New Year’s Eve.
The incident was particularly irritating for Parker, who had to isolate himself over Christmas after a member of his family tested positive, while Fulham’s last two games were postponed due to coronavirus cases among the team.
“I’m disappointed,” Parker said. “The football club and I were deeply disappointed to see Aleks’s photo.
“He understands that he has made a mistake. He understands that it was irresponsible. It is not acceptable. We have dealt with it as a football club internally.”
“Like anyone, he makes mistakes and the one who made Aleks, will have to live with the consequences.”
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