Wales fans have narrowly avoided a crushing blow after the Italian government made a late decision to delay implementing a five-day quarantine for British travellers until Monday owing to the Euro 2020 clash with Italy in Rome on Sunday.
The Welsh team played their opening two fixtures against Switzerland and Turkey in Baku, Azerbaijan, however their final Group A came is against the Italians in the capital city.
Hundreds of fans are expecting to make the trip out to Italy for the fixture, just as they did for Baku, however these last-minute rules brought into place by the Italian government looked set to ruin many supporters' plans at the 11th hour.
In a Facebook post, Italian Health Minister Roberto Speranza said he had “signed a new order” that would “introduce a five-day quarantine with swab obligation for those from Great Britain.”
While he did not confirm when the restrictions will come into place, Reuters reported that a Health Ministry spokesperson has confirmed it would be Saturday. In effect, it meant Wales supporters travelling to the country after midnight on Friday would be unable to attend the game at Rome's Stadio Olimpico.
However, now it appears that the Italian government have been forced to delay the implementation of the new rules by two days after considering the impact it would have on Welsh fans travelling out to Rome for Sunday's game.
After the initial news was announced, The Times' Italian correspondent Tom Kingston said the quarantine rules would come into action on Monday, writing that a government source said: "We took the game into consideration when we made the decision on timings."
From May 16, the country had not implemented any quarantine rules for British travellers, with only negative Covid tests, taken within 48 hours of travel, needed to board a flight.
However, Italy, which remains on the UK's amber travel list, which means those returning to the UK from the country must quarantine for 10 days upon their return, have now decided to implement their own period of isolation.
It comes after the UK announced 11,007 new cases of Covid on Thursday, the most in a single day since February.
