Mahesh Acharya

Kathmandu, May 11:

Three of the four semi-finalist squads have been suffering from diarrhoea ahead of their semis. Except Blue Star Sporting Club of Sri Lanka, all other teams — Three Star Club, Dordoi-Dynamo and Regar TadAZg — players are indisposed, which doctors suspect is due to food-poisoning.

“We cannot say right now for sure and we have sent samples for lab tests, but we suspect it to be food-poisining,” said the doctors. One of the Nepali team doctor too is down with the same symptoms.

Except second-choice goalkeeper Ujjwol Manandhar and midfielder Rajesh Shahi, all other players and the officials of the Nepali team have been hit.

“It’s not just our team, almost all are suffering, including the security personnels,” said Jai Krishna Shrestha, member of TSC’s technical team. “Pradip (Maharjan) is in a bad shape, we just hope that he will be okay for tomorrow’s match,” said skipper Upendra Man Singh. General Coordinator of the tournament Indran Rasasingham was unaware of the situation. “I came to know about this when I returned from Nagarkot this afternoon, and ANFA has already ordered an inquiry.”

When asked about resheduling the matches due to current situation Rasasingham said, “The AFC tournament director is here and I will talk to him about it. If the situation remains the same and players are not in playing condition, we will try to reschedule the semi-finals for Friday and the final will be held as scheduled.”