Coronavirus: Meet the football team banned from going back to Wuhan

Chinese Super League side arrived in Spain at the end of January and still have little idea of when they will be able to return home

For Wuhan Zall, the days cease to have meaning other than avoiding the night. The Chinese Super League side train intensely and indefinitely, attempting to stave off the reality of their situation. For a while, it works too. Their football brings utterly meaningless fun, a distraction and escape. But without it, the tragedy comes back into focus, the messages from home pouring in, then the phone calls until finally morning comes. “It’s not been easy for any of us,” says the team’s captain, Yao Hanlin. “We miss our friends and families.”

It has been almost a month now since the team arrived in Spain for their warm-weather training camp. Already preparing for the new season on China’s south coast, they were locked out of Wuhan when it was placed under quarantine on 22 January. In a city five times the size of Greater London, the silence is eerie and impenetrable, its roads sealed off with biosecurity checkpoints, governed by fear and uncertainty. The population remains indoors while makeshift hospitals are hastily erected and nobody truly knows what the end may look like.

Fourteen members of Wuhan Zall’s squad are originally from the city at the centre of the coronavirus outbreak, their relatives out of reach, their children without their fathers. Only recently, one player received word that his grandmother had passed away. “They are the ones going through an extremely hard time,” Yao continues. “I hope they persevere.”

Yet they find themselves here, stranded in springtime Madrid, braving smiles and whispering amongst themselves, left without anywhere to go. A group of around 50 players and staff have become used to this unremitting cycle, and they speak of their belief in Wuhan as a “heroic city” and its determination to reach a “final victory” over the virus. Many have made efforts to support them, and their manager, Jose Gonzalez, attempts to make the days “as fun as possible” to keep the players occupied. “We have to enjoy the pleasure football brings,” says Yao.

But for the only team burdened by Wuhan’s name, their purgatory in Spain has not always been met with acceptance. Trepidation and terror have spread just as fast as the virus, and compassion has been a victim of self-preservation. The squad were all tested before arriving in Spain, ensuring they brought no risk to the public, and yet doctors were on hand “to greet” them at the airport in Andalusia. A public service announcement by the regional ministry of health assured that “there isn't the slightest chance of any of the people who make up this expedition having an infection”. Gonzalez, who was born in Cadiz, felt the need to rise to their defence.

Wuhan Zall FC arrive at Malaga airport in January (AP)

“They are not walking viruses,” he said. “The name Wuhan will scare many people. I hope that in Spain they find a little empathy. It can't be easy to be so many miles away from your family knowing that they are in the quarantine zone. I hope that we show signs of decency and be sensible.”

Nevertheless, while the team continued to train, friendlies against FK Krasnodar and Europa Point were suddenly cancelled. As the players took questions from a small handful of media, one reporter was overheard questioning why he would wish to write about a team based in the city that had “spread the virus” to his native country. A British newspaper, after hearing the squad had been invited to attend the Clasico, rang La Liga for comment to clarify their reasoning behind the decision. The players are unwillingly in the eye of this state of frenzy and paranoia - the stares, mutterings, even outright xenophobia - and inevitably it weighs heavily on them. Still, though, it bears little resemblance to the gravity of danger back home.

“I’m not feeling threatened [here],” one member of staff told The Independent. “I just hope everything gets better so we can get back as soon as possible. We are concerned, but as far as we can see everything is under control.”

Hopeful estimates suggest the team may be able to return to Wuhan in mid-April. The reality is nobody is quite sure. Like everyone, the players are living under the virus’s jurisdiction, and from Madrid they are set to move back south to Marbella, where the days of repetitive training will continue to blur into one. Instagram, one player says, has become the truest glimpse of what’s happening inside their city, but even then they cannot quite ascertain how destructive the virus already is or may still become. Hubei’s vice governor, Xiao Juhua, recently admitted the situation remains “severe and complicated”. Thousands of extra hospital beds have been made available, but to a city of 11 million that only offers the faintest of reassurance.

Wuhan's players pose outside LaLiga's headquarters in Madrid (EPA)

The only certainty is that, eventually, Wuhan will emerge from this catastrophe, repairing itself one piece at a time, healing from family to neighbour. Until then, though, the players can only wait as their every sense screams to return home. Football binds them together and acts as their solace, and as they stood in the stands at the Santiago Bernabeu, it was another small reprieve from the anguish.

Afterwards, while supporters spilt back into Madrid’s streets and celebrated victory, the team returned to their hotel and the night crept in like any other: the trauma at home; the safety of their relatives; the tragedy unfolding through a mobile phone screen; an unthinkable nightmare long before they fall asleep.