POSITIVE TESTS

Aberdeen’s potential Europa League opponents Sporting Lisbon caught up in coronavirus crisis

ABERDEEN’S potential Euro opponents Sporting Lisbon have been caught up in a Covid-19 crisis.

The Portuguese side were forced to cancel a friendly with Italian side Napoli after three of their players tested positive for the disease.

The trio - who have yet to be named - have been removed from the squad and placed in isolation.

The remainder of Ruben Amorim’s players have so far returned negative tests but will have to be screened again in the next 48 hours.

Aberdeen will face Sporting in a fortnight’s time if they beat Norwegians Viking Stavanger on Thursday.

Derek McInnes and his players will head to Scandinavia on Wednesday for the Europa League second qualifying round clash.

Meanwhile, Scotland's national clinical director has rejected Neil Lennon's call for the government to follow American football's lead and get fans back into stadiums.

The Celtic manager said he couldn't understand why his club's ground couldn't be opened up after watching Kansas City Chiefs welcoming almost 18,000 fans to Arrowhead Stadium for the opening NFL game this season.

However, Professor Jason Leitch has insisted Scotland should not be following the example of the United States because of the high rate of Covid-19 deaths there.

He said:"I saw that and I looked up Kansas City's coronavirus numbers as that's where that game was.

"Their death rate is the same as our case rate. So their mortality is the same as our number of people who have the virus.

"So I don't think we should be taking our example from Kansas City.

"I'm not sure we should be taking our example actually from the US. I think we should learn from international countries, good and bad, but I'm not going to learn from Kansas City."