NAIROBI, March 9 (Xinhua) -- The Coronavirus outbreak has limited Kenya players' availability for their next match against Comoros in the Africa Cup of Nations 2021 qualifiers in Nairobi.
International Michael Olunga and Masoud Juma are among the foreign-based players who have been omitted from the Harambee Stars for the March 25 match.
Olunga, who plays in Japan and Algerian-based player Masoud Juma are in countries that have confirmed cases of coronavirus.
"I can confirm that we have a number of top players who will not make it for the Comoros game because of the coronavirus outbreak," Nick Mwendwa, Football Kenya Federation (FKF) President said on Monday.
The government has banned any meetings of international status to stop the spread of the virus and its national teams have been barred from competing abroad.
This has forced head coach Francis Kimanzi to call only 16 local-based players for training in Nairobi, which sees the return of Eugene Asike after a three-year break.
Kenya faces Egypt, Togo and Comoros. After the first two rounds in November, Comoros are top of the group on four points from their two matches, Egypt and Kenya are both on two while Togo has one point.
Kimanzi will however not sweat the coronavirus threat.
"We thank the local clubs for releasing the players so as to enable early preparations ahead of the match against Comoros," Kimanzi said.
"We have 16 players in camp at the moment and we will be expecting foreign-based players to join them in the next two weeks," Kimanzi said.
The top two sides in 11 of the 12 groups will all advance to the 2021 finals in Cameroon.
Cameroon qualifies for the finals as hosts but are taking part in the qualifying campaign to gain competitive match practice which means just one team from Group F will progress to the finals.
