England take on the Czech Republic in their final group game of the European Championship and before that, the English camp has been hit with a coronavirus scare.
Earlier this week Scotland had confirmed that midfielder Billy Gilmour has tested positive for the coronavirus and will miss their game vs Croatia on Tuesday. And since his Chelsea teammates Ben Chilwell and Mason Mount had prolonged contact with him last Friday, the English pair have now been moved into isolation.
All three Chelsea players were seen hugging each other after the England vs Scotland game and it’s being claimed that Mount and Chilwell also chatted with Gilmour inside the tunnel.
So naturally, all the England players have had to go through PCR tests and as an added precaution, Mason Mount and Chilwell have been separated from the rest of the squad.
A statement from the Football Association read: “As a precaution at this time and in consultation with Public Health England, Ben Chilwell and Mason Mount are isolating after interaction with Scotland player Billy Gilmour at Friday’s match.
“The pair will be kept away from the rest of the England players and wider support team, pending further discussions with PHE. The entire squad had lateral flow tests on Monday afternoon and all were again negative, as was the case with Sunday’s UEFA pre-match PCR tests.
“We will continue to follow all Covid-19 protocols and the UEFA testing regime, while remaining in close contact with PHE.”
An update from the #ThreeLions camp… pic.twitter.com/sPwBVgvGzo
— England (@England) June 21, 2021
The pair are now major doubts from Tuesday’s game against the Czech Republic and according to Gareth Southgate, the Chelsea players could be absent for any many as 10 days.
Asked if the pair will feature on Tuesday, Southgate replied, as per Sky Sports: “We don’t know at the moment.
“There’s obviously got to be quite a doubt but there’s still a lot of discussions and investigations going on behind the scenes, so at the moment they’re isolating and we just have to find out over the next 12 hours or so.
“We had worked with the players this morning on the training pitch, so of course then you find out as you finish that this is the situation, so I can’t say it isn’t disruptive of course.
“We don’t really know at this point whether they might be ok for tomorrow or they could be out for 10 days, so there’s a lot of unknowns frankly at this moment in time.
“Although we worked on the training pitch, we hadn’t confirmed the team. We put some players in and moved them around, so we hadn’t confirmed the team yet and we’ll wait until the morning when we’re really clear on the final situation on the two boys as to where we stand.”
Who will replace Mason Mount & Ben Chilwell in the England starting XI?
Ben Chilwell was pushing for a spot in the starting line-up but now that he is isolating, Manchester United left-back Luke Shaw will keep his place in the side.
Shaw started the match against Scotland and has been in fine form during the 2020-21 season so Gareth Southgate does not have much to worry about in that area of the pitch.
But, the absence of Mason Mount could be a huge problem for the England boss since the midfielder has been the standout player for them so far in the European Championship.
In both their matches, Mount has been playing as the No 10 and he was the one who was shouldering much of the responsibility in midfield.
Now that he is missing, maybe Jack Grealish will finally get a start for England after having come on as a sub last Friday vs Scotland.
Pundits have been urging Gareth Southgate to use the Aston Villa man and with Mason Mount set to miss out, Grealish could take up that attacking playmaker’s role.
The absence of Mount and the use of Jack Grealish as a No 10 could also be beneficial for either Raheem Sterling or Phil Foden since one of them might get the chance to start against the Czech Republic.
Both the Man City players were underwhelming against Scotland which is why Jack Grealish was supposed to replace one of them on Tuesday. But if Grealish is playing as the main playmaker then one of the two City players will get to keep their place in the line-up.
