Six virus cases recorded in Premier League testing

MANCHESTER, ENGLAND — The English Premier League’s first wave of mass coronavirus testing of players and staff found only six people infected at three of the 19 soccer clubs to conduct checks.

Socially distant training sessions can now begin, without the involvement of the six people with COVID-19 who have to self-isolate for seven days. They include Burnley assistant manager Ian Woan, whose positive test was announced by the club. Burnley said Woan was asymptomatic.

The league is not identifying whether players or coaches tested positive from the tests on 748 people Sunday and Monday. “The Premier League is providing this aggregated information for the purposes of competition integrity and transparency,” the league said in a statement.

The competition has been suspended since March due to the pandemic. A relaxation of national lockdown regulations is only now allowing noncontact training to resume, with a maximum of five players working together for up to 75 minutes a day at training facilities.

While the top divisions in Belgium, France and the Netherlands have been curtailed, the Premier League has government backing to plan a return to action in June. But the aim of restarting around June 12 looks hard to meet. Approval for contact training and games resuming rely on no new spike in COVID-19 cases in the country with the second-highest known deaths from the disease after the United States.