Tottenham issue strongly-worded statement after Arsenal game postponement

In an official statement, Tottenham made it clear that they are unhappy about the decision to postpone their game against Arsenal that was due to take place on Sunday.

"We regret to announce that Sunday’s north London derby against Arsenal has been postponed," the statement on Spurs' official website reads.

"This follows an application from Arsenal to the Premier League on the basis of a combination of COVID, existing and recent injuries and players on international duty at the Africa Cup of Nations.

"We are extremely surprised that this application has been approved.

"We ourselves were disqualified from the European Conference League after a significant number of COVID cases meant we needed to reschedule a fixture and our application to move our Leicester fixture was not approved - only for it to be subsequently postponed when Leicester applied.

"The original intention of the guidance was to deal with player availability directly affected by COVID cases, resulting in depleted squads that, when taken together with injuries, would result in the club being unable to field a team.

"We do not believe it was the intent to deal with player availability unrelated to COVID. We may now be seeing the unintended consequences of this rule. It is important to have clarity and consistency on the application of the rule."

Only Martin Odegaard was known to have tested positive for Covid prior to the decision to postpone the game. The rest of the absentees are either injured or travelled for AFCON.

The Atheltic reported that another player's positive test emerged after the announcement.

Source: Tottenham Hotspur