LDN - Sports

Impact of COVID-19 pandemic on sports events around the world

[May 06, 2020] (Reuters) - Major sports events around the world that are in the process of re-starting or have been rescheduled due to the COVID-19 pandemic:

SOCCER

* The 20 English Premier League clubs have discussed plans for a resumption of training this month followed by a possible return to action in June.

* The German Bundesliga is set to be given the green light for a restart, probably from May 15 with no fans in stadiums.

* Clubs in Spain's top two divisions are returning to individual training this week as organisers aim to re-start La Liga in June.

* Bulgaria's top clubs will resume training within a few days and the BFU hopes to resume the top-flight season in June.

* Italian clubs have been given permission to start training individually but no team exercises will be allowed until May 18.

* Portugal's top flight clubs resumed training on Monday amid plans to restart the league on May 30.

* The Hungarian soccer season will re-start on May 23 with two cup ties and a league game.

* Major League Soccer will open up training fields for individual workouts from next week.

* Denmark's football association (DBU) hopes to resume its top flight Super League on May 29.

* Austrian clubs returned to training on April 20 ahead of a possible resumption of the season, which would be played without fans.

* The 2020 K-League season will kick off on May 8 behind closed doors.

* Poland's professional football league said it intends to re-start matches on May 29 and complete the season by July 19.

* Euro 2020 and Copa America were postponed. The two tournaments will now be staged from June 11 to July 11, 2021.

* Asian Champions League: Matches involving Chinese clubs Guangzhou Evergrande, Shanghai Shenhua and Shanghai SIPG were postponed. The start of the knockout rounds was moved back to September.

BASEBALL

* The South Korean league started on May 5 without fans.

GOLF

* Rory McIlroy, Dustin Johnson, Rickie Fowler and Matthew Wolff will take part in a $3 million charity skins match on May 17.

* Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson, Tom Brady and Peyton Manning will compete in a charity golf match in May.

* The Harding Park golf course which is scheduled to host the PGA Championship in August re-opened on Monday.

* The Masters at Augusta National Golf Club has been rescheduled for Nov. 12-15 from April 9-12.

* The PGA Championships at TPC Harding Park San Francisco, has been rescheduled for Aug. 6-9 from May 14-17.

* The U.S. Open at Winged Foot Golf Club, Mamaroneck, New York, was rescheduled to Sept. 17-20 from June 8-21.

TENNIS

* Professional tennis returned with the Tennis Point Exhibition Series event in Germany on May 1.

* A number of high-profile male and female players will compete in the UTR Pro Match Series in Florida starting May 8.

* Patrick Mouratoglou's tennis academy in France will host a five-week series in May.

CYCLING

* Giro d'Italia will begin on Oct. 3, while the Spanish Vuelta will be held from Oct. 20.

* Milan-Sanremo will be held on Aug. 8, Liege-Bastogne-Liege on Oct. 4, the Tour des Flandres on Oct. 18, Paris-Roubaix on Oct. 25 and the Tour of Lombardy on Oct. 31.

* The Tour de France that was due to be held from June 27-July 19 has been postponed to Aug. 29-Sept 20.

RUGBY LEAGUE

* Australia's National Rugby League is set for a May 28 restart after players agreed to 20% pay-cuts for the abridged 2020 season.

OLYMPICS

* The postponed Tokyo Olympic Games will now begin on July 23, 2021 and run until Aug. 8.

* World Athletics has suspended Olympic qualification until December.

PARALYMPICS

The postponed Paralympic Games will run from Aug. 24-Sep. 5, 2021.

WORLD GAMES

* The 2021 World Games have been pushed back by a year to avoid clashing with the Olympics.

ATHLETICS

* The World Athletics Championships scheduled for 2021 in Eugene, Oregon have been moved to the summer of 2022 because of the Olympic Games rescheduling.

* The World Athletics Indoor Championships (Nanjing, March 13-15) were postponed to March 19-21, 2021.

MARATHON

* Boston Marathon organisers have postponed the race from April 20 to Sept. 14.

HORSE RACING

The Kentucky Derby, the first jewel in North American horse racing's Triple Crown (May 2) was postponed to Sept. 5.

MOTOR SPORTS

* NASCAR said its season would resume on May 17 at the Darlington Raceway in South Carolina.

* The Le Mans 24 hours race was postponed from June 13-14 to Sept. 19-20.

* The Indianapolis 500 has been postponed until Aug. 23.

SNOOKER

* The World Snooker Championship, originally scheduled to begin on April 18, will start on July 31 at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield.

SWIMMING

* The 2020 European Aquatics Championships scheduled to take place from May 11-24 in Budapest, Hungary, have been postponed to next year.

TENNIS

* The French Open was postponed until Sept. 20-Oct. 4.

List of sports events that have either been cancelled or postponed due to the outbreak:

OLYMPIC TRIALS

* U.S. trials for wrestling (April 4-5) were postponed.

* U.S. Rowing postponed its team trials.

* U.S. diving trials (April 3-5) were postponed.

NORTH AMERICA

* The NBA suspended its season.

* The NHL suspended its season.

* The MLB has further delayed its 2020 season's opening day of March 26.

* The Women's National Basketball Association postponed the start of its 2020 regular season, originally scheduled to run from May 15-Sept. 20.

SOCCER

* FIFA has agreed to delay the first edition of its revamped Club World Cup due to be held in 2021.

* UEFA put all club and national team competitions for men and women on hold until further notice.

* The men's and women's Champions League finals and Europa League final originally scheduled for May have been postponed.

* French league organisers decided to abandon the 2019-20 season, with Paris St Germain being awarded the Ligue 1 title and Amiens and Toulouse relegated.

* The top-flight Dutch season was cancelled and no league title was awarded.

* The Scottish Premiership remains suspended but the second, third and fourth tiers have ended their seasons.

* South America's two biggest club competitions, the Copa Libertadores and Copa Sudamericana, are suspended.

* CONCACAF suspended all competitions, including the Champions League and men's Olympic qualifiers.

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Dummies are seen replacing the audience during the match, despite most sports being cancelled around the world the local league starts behind closed doors due to the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) REUTERS/Kim Hong-Ji

* Asian and South American qualifying matches for 2022 World Cup were postponed.

* New seasons in the Chinese, Japanese and South Korean leagues were postponed.

* The Asian Football Confederation on April 14 postponed all matches and competitions scheduled for May-June until further notice.

* The Brazilian football Confederation suspended all national competitions until further notice.

* Semi-finals of the CAF Champions league (May 1-3) and CAF Confederation Cup (May 8-10) were postponed.

* This year's International Champions Cup, a pre-season tournament featuring Europe's top clubs, was cancelled.

OTHER SPORTS

ATHLETICS

* The Diamond League, the elite track and field competition, was forced to postpone events in seven cities scheduled between April and June.

* The London, Paris and Barcelona marathons were postponed.

AUSTRALIAN RULES

* The Australian Football League's attempt to forge on with the season despite the virus outbreak lasted one round before it was shut down on March 22.

BADMINTON

* The Badminton World Federation (BWF) cancelled the last five tournaments in the qualification period for the Olympics.

* The Indonesia Open (June 16-21) was among a host of events that have been cancelled while tournaments over the next three months were also suspended in Australia, Thailand and Russia.

* The U.S. Open, set to be held from June 23-28 in California, was suspended.

BASEBALL

* The final qualification tournament in Taiwan for the Olympics was put back from April to June 17-21, while the March 22-26 qualification event in Arizona was postponed.

BASKETBALL

* The International Basketball Federation postponed the men's Olympic qualifiers, European Championship and the Americas Championship by a year.

BOXING

* Anthony Joshua's world heavyweight title defence against Bulgarian Kubrat Pulev at Tottenham Hotspur's stadium on June 20 was postponed.

CRICKET

* The Indian Premier League, originally suspended until April 15, has been postponed indefinitely.

* The last two games of Australia's three-match one-day international series against New Zealand in Sydney and Hobart were cancelled while the limited-overs tours were postponed.

* The boards of India and South Africa agreed to reschedule a three-match ODI series to a later date.

* England's test series against Sri Lanka and West Indies were postponed. The England and Wales Cricket Board extended the suspension of the professional game in the country until July 1.

* South Africa's limited-overs tour of Sri Lanka that was scheduled to take place in June has been postponed.

* Australia's proposed test tour of Bangladesh in June has been postponed.

CYCLING

* The final two stages of the UAE Tour were cancelled after two Italian participants tested positive.

* The Paris-Nice cycling race ended a day early after the eighth stage into Nice was cancelled.

GOLF

* The Open Championships was cancelled.

* The European Tour cancelled the BMW International Open (June 25-28) and the Open de France (July 2-5). The Scottish Open (July 9-12) was postponed. The Tour had postponed or cancelled events scheduled between March and May.

HORSE RACING

* The Grand National festival (April 2-4) was cancelled.

* The Dubai World Cup, one of the world's richest horse races and a premier annual sporting event in the United Arab Emirates, will not go ahead this year.

* The Guineas Festival at Newmarket in May and June's Epsom Derby have been postponed while June's Royal Ascot may be held without spectators.

* British horse racing will remain suspended beyond April with no new date set for ending the suspension.

MOTORSPORT

* Seven Formula One races were postponed while Grands Prix in Australia, Monaco and France were cancelled. F1 hopes to start the delayed season in Austria in July without spectators before ending in Abu Dhabi in December.

* The first round of the MotoGP season in Qatar was cancelled while races scheduled until July have been postponed.

RUGBY

* Four Six Nations matches were postponed.

* France's rugby federation suspended all its competitions and will not be allowed to return until September.

* The European rugby season was suspended after European Professional Club Rugby postponed Champions Cup and Challenge Cup quarter-final matches (April 3-5).

* The semi-final and final of this season's Champions Cup and Challenge Cup tournaments, which were due to take place in Marseille in May, have been postponed.

* England's Rugby Football Union and Wales' governing body confirmed the end of the 2019-20 season for all league, cup and county rugby, but the English Premiership has been excluded.

* Super Rugby suspended its season.

SURFING

* The World Surfing League extended the postponement of events through June while also announcing a major overhaul for future tours, with details on a post-season surf-off to be announced in July.

TENNIS

* The Wimbledon championships were cancelled for the first time since World War Two while professional tennis has been suspended until July 13.

* The Fed Cup finals (Budapest; April 14-19) were postponed.

WINTER SPORTS

* The International Ski Federation cancelled the final races of the men's Alpine skiing World Cup.

* The World Cup finals in Cortina were cancelled along with the last three women's races in Are.

* The women's world ice hockey championships in Canada were cancelled.

* The Ice Hockey World Championship scheduled for Switzerland in May was cancelled.

* The speed skating world championships in Seoul were postponed until at least October.

* The March 16-22 world figure skating championships in Montreal were cancelled.

* The Kontinental Hockey League (KHL) has cancelled the remainder of its season after temporarily suspending its playoffs.

(Compiled by Shrivathsa Sridhar, Rohith Nair, Hardik Vyas and Simon Jennings in Bengaluru, Amy Tennery in New York, Andrew Both in Cary, Robert Muller in Prague, Gene Cherry in Raleigh and Frank Pingue in Toronto; Editing by London editing team)

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