What sporting events are affected by the pandemic?

in news •  5 years ago 

As the virus spreads across the globe, sports bodies are cancelling or postponing events.
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The French Open has been postponed by four months and will now be played in September

Foodball

The CONCACAF (Confederation of North, Central American and Caribbean Association Football) Nations League Finals, which were scheduled for June 4 to June 7, have been suspended. The finals, due to be contested by Costa Rica, Honduras, Mexico and the United States and held in the Houston and Dallas areas of Texas, will be rescheduled for a later date in venues to be determined.

Football in Russia has been suspended until April 10. The Russian league was the best-attended sports competition still operating in Europe last weekend, with more than 33,000 fans at one of its games, but the Russian Football Union agreed to immediately suspend all competitions at a meeting on March 17.

In Germany, the top-flight Bundesliga has been on hold since March 13, with the German Football League recommending clubs not to return to training until April 5. Bayern Munich football team announced their players will return to training "in small groups from Monday, 6 April" with no members of the public present.

The African Nations Championship 2020 soccer tournament scheduled for April in Cameroon has been postponed indefinitely, the African Football Federation said in a statement on March 17.

This year's Copa America has been postponed until 2021, the South American Football Confederation (CONMEBOL) said on March 17. The 12-team tournament had originally been scheduled to take place from June 12 to July 12 in Colombia and Argentina.

The Euro 2020 tournament has been postponed until 2021, European football's governing body UEFA said in a statement on March 17. UEFA said that the 24-team tournament, which was due to be staged in 12 nations across the continent from June 12 to July 12 this year, would now take place from June 11 to July 11 2021.

In England, all elite football has been suspended until at least April 30.
UEFA on April 1 suspended all Champions League and Europa League matches "until further notice".

All national team games scheduled for June have also been postponed.

FIFA and the Asian Football Confederation have agreed to postpone the Asian World Cup qualifying matches in March and June.

New seasons in the Chinese, Japanese and South Korean professional leagues have been postponed.

Asian Champions League matches involving Chinese clubs Guangzhou Evergrande, Shanghai Shenhua and Shanghai SIPG have been postponed. The start of the knockout rounds has been moved back to September.

The Confederation of African Football has postponed two rounds of the 2021 Africa Cup of Nations qualifiers scheduled for March 25-31.

An exhibition match between Mexico and Colombia on May 30 at Denver has been cancelled.

The three divisions of England's National League have also been suspended indefinitely.

Marathons

The London Marathon, which was scheduled to take place on April 26, has been postponed until October 4.

The Boston Marathon, originally scheduled for April 4, is now expected to take place on September 14.

Amsterdam, Paris and Barcelona marathons have also been postponed.

In Japan on March 1, the Tokyo Marathon, which usually attracts 300,000 participants, was restricted to only 200 elite runners.

Olympic Games

The International Olympic Committee and Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe have concluded the Tokyo 2020 Olympics must be postponed.

The decision was made after holding out for weeks as local organisers and the IOC came under increasing pressure from athletes, national Olympic bodies and sports federations.

The event will now take place from July 23 to August 8, 2021.

Athletics

The World Athletics Championships scheduled to take place in Oregon in August 2021 have been pushed back to July 2022 to avoid clashing with the rescheduled Olympic Games, the sport's governing body said on April 8.

World Athletics said in a statement that it "approved the new dates this week after extensive discussions with the sport's stakeholders."

The World Athletics Indoor Championships, scheduled for Nanjing from March 13 to 15, have been postponed until next year.

Formula 1

The Azerbaijan Grand Prix became the latest postponement in the calendar, meaning there will be no Formula One races until the middle of June at the earliest.

The race at the Baku City Circuit was scheduled for June 7.

Formula 1 has cancelled the season-opening Australian GP after a McLaren team member contracted the coronavirus. The race was scheduled to take place on March 15.

The Bahrain Grand Prix and the Vietnam Grand Prix have been postponed. Those events were first scheduled to take place on March 20-22 and April 3-5 respectively.
The Chinese Grand Prix in Shanghai, which was scheduled to take place on April 19, was also called off.

Races in the Netherlands, Spain and Monaco in May have all been postponed, the governing motorsport body FIA said on March 19.

Formula 1 Canadian Grand Prix organisers announced on April 7 that the race in Montreal that was supposed to kick off the 2020 World Championship calendar will be postponed until further notice.


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