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Bruno Fernandes has returned to training at Manchester United after testing positive for coronavirus and is in contention to play in Tuesday’s Champions League clash with Atletico Madrid.
The Portuguese midfielder – who has netted nine times and laid on 14 assists this season – missed Saturday’s 3-2 victory over Tottenham in the Premier League and was a doubt to play against Atletico.
But Fernandes now appears to have recorded a negative test and reported to training at Carrington on Monday ahead of the visit of Atletico.
It remains to be seen if Fernandes will come straight back into the starting XI, however, with United having performed excellently without him against Spurs as Cristiano Ronaldo netted a superb hat-trick.
Luke Shaw was also missing from the team on Saturday, but he reported for duty and could reclaim his place from Alex Telles despite the Brazilian’s late assist against Spurs.
Speaking on Saturday evening, interim boss Ralf Rangnick – who will address the media again later today – confirmed that Fernandes was facing a ‘last-minute race’ to make the Atletico match.
Asked about Fernandes’ availability, the German said: ‘I don’t know. We have to be careful with Covid tests.
‘David [de Gea] was the same. David yesterday was out, he was not supposed to play but then it turned out that his first fast test was false. He took another one or two quick tests then a PCR test and that was negative. I only decided in the morning that he was going to play.’
He added: ‘Luke hopefully will be back in training tomorrow and Bruno we will have to wait and see until Tuesday. This will probably be a last-minute race with him.’
Scott McTominay was also absent with a calf problem but could return, with Rangnick explaining: ‘With Scotty, I hope so but he had some muscular problems with his calf.
‘That’s why we decided not to play him (against Spurs), because Scotty is quite like Fred, he is only valuable if he can perform with 100 per cent of his physical capacity and rather than playing him at maybe 80 per cent and take the risk that he will be out for Tuesday, we decided to not play him.’
United survived something of a first-half onslaught in Madrid in the first leg and bring a 1-1 draw back to Old Trafford thanks to Anthony Elanga’s second-half strike.
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Source: Metro Sport
