Ronaldo left out of Juventus squad against Barcelona
The match would have been the first time Ronaldo faced his personal rival Lionel Messi since he left Real Madrid in 2018.
Juventus' Portuguese forward Cristiano Ronaldo warms up prior to the Italian Serie A football match Roma vs Juventus at the Olympic stadium in Rome on September 27, 2020.
Portuguese star Cristiano Ronaldo has been left out of Juventus' team for Wednesday's Champions League clash against Barcelona in Turin, two weeks after testing positive for coronavirus.
The 35-year-old, the top scorer in the history of the competition with 130 goals, needed to test negative 24 hours before the game against his great rival Lionel Messi's Spanish team.
A furious Ronaldo posted a photo on Instagram, with the comment: "Feeling good and healthy! Forza Juve! #finoallafine."
He added a comment on the swab tests used to detect the virus: "PCR IS BULLS***."
Ronaldo, who has more than 241 million Instagram followers, later removed that comment.
Tested positive 18 times
Ronaldo first tested positive for Covid-19 two weeks ago while playing with Portugal, and has been in self-isolation since returning to Italy.
According to Portuguese TV1, the five-time Ballon d'Or winner has tested positive 18 times.
The match against Barcelona, which kicks off at 2000 GMT, will be the fourth missed by Ronaldo, who has no symptoms of the virus, and has posted photos of himself training on social media.
Footballing legends Ronaldo and Messi will now, all being well, meet in the reverse Group G fixture in Barcelona on December 8.
They have not faced off since the Portuguese superstar left Real Madrid for Juventus in 2018.
On Tuesday, Juventus refused to comment on Italian media reports that Ronaldo’s latest test was still positive for Covid-19.
Alvaro Morata replaced Ronaldo against Dynamo Kyiv last week and scored twice in a 2-0 win in Group G.
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