Marseille, PSG game postponed over swine flu

The French football match between Marseille and Paris Saint Germain was postponed on Sunday after players contracted swine flu, the French Football League announced.

Paris Saint-Germain had on Saturday confirmed that their former France international attacking midfielder Ludovic Giuly and defender Mamadou Sakho had contracted swine flu.

It was then announced on Sunday that midfielder Jeremy Clement had also contracted the virus and there were fears that two of the rest of the squad had symptoms of the illness. One of these was believed to be striker Louis Arnaud

The squad had been visited on Sunday morning by a French Football Federation doctor and the players are taking an anti-swine flu drug as a preventive measure.

The match is the first in France at the senior level to be cancelled due to swine flu.

“After further examining the health situation among the Paris St Germain squad on Sunday morning, our committee of medical experts issued us with a recommendation to postpone the match with Marseille and to place the PSG players and staff in quarantine for the next 72 hours,” the football league said in a statement.

“We have taken this position in order to avoid any possibility of contagion, including that of the players in the opposing team.

“A new date for the match will be decided later.”