With all the controversy regarding players travelling to the United Kingdom for the past couple of weeks, French side Lyon were afraid they could miss some of their stars in the trip to face Rangers.
Brazilian midfielders Lucas Paquetá and Bruno Guimarães have both been in South America during the international break, which means they’d need to quarantine when landing in Scotland. Also, Xherdan Shaqiri and Jason Denayer haven’t been fully vaccinated and stay out of the match as well.
Now L’Equipe features a story explaining the whole situation ahead of the Rangers match, which seems to have ended up with a positive outcome for Lyon.
According to their story, UEFA found a way to let both Brazilians play the match. There are no details on the agreement between the entity and the Scottish authorities, who previously didn’t accept the club’s proposal when promising they’d fly in private planes and stay in a closed hotel.
Regarding the non vaccinated players, those are two different cases. Both would also need to quarantine when returning to France, therefore missing the matches against Paris Saint Germain and Troyes.
Denayer had Covid at the end of July and can’t even have the first dose for now. However, he has a ‘valid health pass’ which makes him an exception and would theoretically allow him to travel to face Rangers.
But Shaqiri, who’s waiting for his second dose, lives a different scenario and would need to isolate when landing France. So Lyon would rather have him available for the two Ligue 1 matches instead of lining him up against Rangers, and decided not to take him to Scotland.
