Despite coach Sébastien Desabre and most of the roster playing professionally in Europe, any symptoms from local arriving staff could disqualify DR Congo from competing at the World Cup; Yankee Scores reports…
Congo national team have 21 days to be under isolation or else they risk being denied entry into the United States to participate in the World Cup due to the ongoing Ebola outbreak in the African country, Andrew Giuliani, executive director of the White House Task Force for the World Cup, said on Friday during an interview with ESPN.
Giuliani disclosed that the United States has notified FIFA, the Congo national team, and the Government of Congo that they must remain in a bubble in Belgium while preparing for their upcoming warm-up games.
The Travel Threat
“We’ve been very clear to Congo that they should maintain the integrity of their bubble for 21 days before they can then come to Houston on June 11th,” he said. “We’ve made it very clear to the Congo government as well, that they need to maintain that bubble or they risk not being able to travel to the United States. We cannot be any clearer.”
Giuliani said that the U.S. is not taking the health and safety of the World Cup lightly.
“We want to make sure that there is nothing that’s going to come in or near our borders here on this,” he said.
The Diaspora Roster and Staff Risks
Every one of the players from Congo, including their French coach Sébastien Desabre, resides in locations away from the central African country, with many of them playing for French clubs. There have been a few individuals from the staff that resides in Congo to leave the country.
“If there are other people that are going to be coming in, they need to have a separate bubble from that team. If they end up coming, and any of those people end up symptomatic, they are risking the entire team being able to come and compete in this World Cup,” Giuliani said.
The World Health Organization has officially declared it as a public health emergency of international concern. In this connection, the CDC recently stated that the U.S. would stop the entry of all non-U.S. citizens from Congo, Uganda, and South Sudan if they had visited any of these countries within the previous 3 weeks, and the restriction will continue for the next 30 days.
Altered Preparations
Yankee Scores reported on Wednesday that Congo had called off its three-day camp before the World Cup and farewell match in Kinshasa.
Congo’s warm-up matches for the World Cup would be against Denmark at Liege, Belgium, on June 3 and against Chile in southern Spain on June 9.
Congo’s group for the World Cup is Group K. Its matches will be against Portugal on June 17 in Houston, against Colombia on June 23 in Guadalajara, Mexico, and finally against Uzbekistan on June 27 in Atlanta.
In May 2018, President Donald Trump appointed Giuliani, son of former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani, as head of the World Cup task force.
