CL wins may have fuelled pandemic: Gomez

ATALANTA skipper Alejandro Gomez looks back with worry on two memorable Champions League showings he fears may have contributed to one of the worst clusters of coronavirus infections in hard-hit Italy.

“Having played those games was terrible,” the forward said yesterday in an interview with sports daily Ole, which is based in his native Argentina.

He recalled the 45,000 Atalanta fans who on Feb 19 followed the Bergamo side at Milan’s Giuseppe Meazza Stadium, where they hammered Valencia 4-1 in the first leg of the last 16; a 4-3 win behind closed doors in Spain on March 10 sealed progress to the quarterfinals on the Bergamaschi’s first-ever participation in the event.

“I think that the current situation in

Bergamo, which is one of (Italy’s) most infected areas, could depend from its having one of the best hospitals in the Lombardy region, with many people treated here,” he said. “But also from the game we played with Valencia.”

Gomez also said he and his teammates worry about contagion after more than a third of Valencia’s team and staff tested positive.

Atalanta yesterday confirmed that goalkeeper Marco Sportiello, who played in Valencia on March 10 had become their first player to test positive for Covid-19.

With all sporting events suspended and Italy in its third week of lockdown, Gomez said he is continuing his isolation at home with wife and three children.

“I have a hard time thinking about football,” he told Sky TV.

“In this moment it is the last thing I am interested in.”

Bergamo Mayor Giorgio Gori also told foreign journalists the match was “among the sad explanations” for the high infection rate in the city and wider province.

“It’s clear that evening was a situation in which the virus was widely spread,” he said. – dpa/Agencies