Premier League champions City said 21 players and staff were
now isolating for Covid-related reasons as the virus wreaked further havoc on
English football.
“Pep Guardiola will miss tomorrow evening’s FA Cup trip to
Swindon Town after testing positive for Covid-19,” the club said in a statement.
“The City manager recorded a positive test on Tuesday along
with assistant Juanma Lillo. Both are now isolating, along with a number of
other positive cases within the City first-team bubble.
“This brings the number of those isolating for Covid-related
reasons amongst the group to 21. Of that number, 14 are backroom staff and
seven are first-team players.
Despite the outbreak, the third-round FA Cup tie is still
scheduled to go ahead with another of Guardiola’s assistants, Rodolfo Borrell,
taking charge of the team.
The Omicron variant of coronavirus has resulted in record
case numbers across Britain, forcing the postponement of many matches over the
past month.
City are one of the few clubs not to have had a match called
off yet and they have amassed a 10-point lead at the top of the Premier League.
The first leg of Liverpool’s League Cup semi-final against
Arsenal, which had been due to take place on Thursday, was rescheduled after an
outbreak forced Liverpool to close their training ground.
Dyche tested positive on Tuesday, the club said in a
statement.
The Premier League announced on Monday that 94 positive
cases were detected on 14,250 tests carried out on players and staff between
December 27 and January 2.
It was the first week-by-week decrease in positive tests
since early November, with a record 103 positives recorded the previous week.
None of the 32 FA Cup third-round ties set for this weekend
have yet been postponed.