World Cup qualifiers match that we’re scheduled to be played in China will now be played in Dubai. This comes after several players from Syria and Maldives were found infected from the virus.
Seven games were scheduled to be played in Suzhou city amongst China, Syria, Maldives, Philippines, and Guam in Group A for the qualification of the World Cup 2022 in Qatar and the Asian Cup 2023 in China. The players that were infected by the COVID-19, have to go under a strict quarantine upon entry and will not be able to participate in the games as scheduled so to tackle this Chinese Football association discussed with Asian Football Confederation and decided to shift the games to Dubai, which will act as a neutral venue to stage the rest of the games. This decision was taken due to the mounting challenge faced by several participating teams in traveling to China. Maldives and Syria squad are already in Dubai and they were denied permission to depart for China.
China was scheduled to face the Maldives on Thursday after they beat Guam 7-0 and Syria and Maldives were set to play on June 7. China currently stands second in the group table behind Syria and is fighting hard for keeping its hopes alive for the next year’s World Cup.