Guinea Team Hit By Coronavirus Days Ahead Of AFCON

Guinea’s Kemoko Camara, Mickael Dyrestam, Seydouba Camara and Morlaye Sylla on Friday tested positive for Covid-19 with the Africa Cup of Nations set to get underway on Sunday.

The four together with assistant coach Amadou Dyllo have been left in Kigali, Rwanda until they return negative results.

The situation has seen the Syli Nationale team arriving in Yaoundé with only 24 players ahead of their Group B opening match against Malawi on Tuesday.

Like Guinea, Cape Verde, Algeria, Senegal, Cameroon and Tunisia have reported new cases in their squads, while Gambia and Ivory Coast were forced to cancel warmup games because of outbreaks in their squads.

The rise of Covisd-19 cases has already raised concerns for a need to postpone the 24-team, 52-game championship in the Central African nation.

However, the Confederation of African Football stated that the tournament will go on despite the Omicron- variant that has led to the surge of Covid-19 cases.

Cameroon were originally due to stage the African football showcase in 2019 but fell behind with preparations and Egypt stepped in as late replacements.

The 2021 tournament dates have changed twice, first because of fears that torrential seasonal rains could affect the tight schedule, and then because of the pandemic.