On Friday he contributed to the 1-0 home win against Heidenheim in his new old diamond position, on Saturday Jackson Irvine was shocked. The Australian has been infected with Corona and will therefore miss the upcoming World Cup qualifiers of the “Socceroos”. Training with FC St. Pauli is also out of the question at the moment.
Instead of flying to Sydney, the fully vaccinated Irvine was in quarantine at home on Sunday. “We accept the challenge and are prepared for all difficulties,” the 36-time international had explained shortly before, with a view to Australia’s games against Japan (Thursday) and in Saudi Arabia (following Tuesday). But you can only arm yourself against the virus to a limited extent.
World Cup qualification: Irvine misses games against Japan and Saudi Arabia
Little consolation for the 29-year-old: either his teammates will secure their World Cup ticket with two wins without him and thus provide a mental booster in the sickbed – or the recovered Irvine will get another chance in May to play in playoff games to fight at the world championship tournament in November and December.
That’s what St. Pauli professional Irvine says about a boycott of the World Cup in Qatar
Irvine definitely wants to go to Qatar, even though he follows the discussions about the precarious human rights situation on the Arabian Peninsula closely. “I don’t think a World Cup boycott will do anything good,” the midfielder says, rejecting a demonstrative absence from the FIFA event: “It’s good that people are following the situation in Qatar closely. For us as players, it’s about dealing with these important issues and maybe contributing to a positive change.”
Corona: At Aremu, St. Pauli trainer Schultz is cautious
Irvine is at least spared the long-distance travel stress. Whether and how he will be available to FC St. Pauli in Rostock on April 2 depends on the course of the corona disease. As a precaution, the freshly recovered Afeez Aremu, who was hit with a medium difficulty, was rested against Heidenheim.
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“Basically everything is okay with him,” said coach Timo Schultz about Aremu: “But after I had recovered from Corona, I stopped running after eight minutes, so I have a lot of respect for it. We’re talking about the heart and lungs here, I’m different when it comes to such internal medicine things.”