Liverpool, Chelsea managers speak up about Premier League Covid crisis

The English Premier League has been hit by yet another wave of Covid-19 infections due in part to the surge caused by the Omicron variant of the novel coronavirus. The coaches of some of the top teams have weighed in on the crisis, with Tottenham Hotspur manager Antonio Conte calling the situation "scary."

Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp caused a stir after he called unvaccinated players a "constant threat" to the rest of the squad, and threatened their possible exclusion in upcoming lineups. "If a player is not vaccinated at all, he is a constant threat for all of us," Klopp said, as quoted by Marca before the Reds faced the Spurs.

He then laid out the extra measures that need to be taken if a player chooses to remain unvaccinated against the novel coronavirus. "He has to change in a different dressing room, he has to eat in a different dining room, he has to sit in a different bus, he has to drive in a different car: from an organisational point of view, it gets really messy," Klopp claimed.

He also went on to say that the quarantine requirements for unvaccinated players will make it difficult if the club needs to travel for international tournaments.

Meanwhile, Chelsea manager Thomas Tuchel is butting heads with League authorities after the Blues were not allowed to postpone their match against Wolverhampton Wanderers on Sunday. The match ended in a draw, and the Chelsea manager is livid after not being allowed to reschedule despite having seven positive cases within their squad.

"We were putting the health and safety of players at huge risk, physically as well as with COVID," Tuchel said. He claimed that allowing the match to continue was simply not safe for the players of both sides. He also questioned the safety protocols that are currently being implemented.

"I would be not surprised if the next test shows up and we have more positives. How should it stop if we sit in the bus and have dinners and just stay together like nothing happened?," he asked.

Tuchel also spoke about the dangers of asking players to get straight back into action after recovering from Covid-19. "We let Mateo Kovacic play 30 minutes one day after 10 days of COVID. We make him play, who takes responsibility for that?," he asked.

"We need to keep on going if they say we need to keep going."

The crisis has become so extreme that all of the Premier League fixtures on Saturday except for one had to eventually be postponed. It remains to be seen if the league will be forced to take a break.