UEFA Euro 2020 has been postponed for a year as the world fights to contain the COVID-19 pandemic, the Norwegian and Swedish soccer associations said yesterday.
“Postponed until 11/6-11/7 2021. Will get back to you after the meeting,” Swedish Football Association chairman Karl-Erik Nilsson said in a message to Reuters during a UEFA videoconference call.
The Norwegian Football Association also tweeted the news from its Twitter account.
UEFA, which was yet to confirm the decision, was under pressure to push back the tournament to give suspended domestic leagues time to be completed.
European soccer’s governing body was holding a video conference with all 55 of its affiliated national federations, as well as representatives of clubs, leagues and players.
The decision was to go before the UEFA executive committee to be rubber-stamped later yesterday.
It is the first time in the competition’s history that the finals have been postponed.
CANCELED BOOKINGS
News of the postponement broke after Reuters had earlier learned that UEFA had canceled its hotel bookings in Copenhagen, one of the host cities for the championships that had been scheduled to be held from June 12 to July 12 this year.
The CPH Hotel told Reuters by telephone that UEFA had booked 80 of its 102 rooms, but canceled them a little over a week ago.
The Marienlyst Strandhotel, where the Denmark squad is usually based, told Reuters in an e-mail that UEFA had also canceled the rooms booked on behalf of the national team.
The decision to put back the 24-team tournament follows soccer, like numerous other sports, being brought to a virtual standstill by the coronavirus outbreak.
All five of Europe’s top domestic soccer leagues — England, Spain, Italy, France and Germany — have been suspended, along with the UEFA Champions League and Europa League, as well as FIFA World Cup qualifiers.
DOMESTIC WOES
The leagues have urged UEFA to prioritize completing domestic competitions, reflecting a concern that clubs throughout Europe would lose significant ticket and associated match-day revenue by not completing the season while still having to pay their players’ salaries.
Canceled seasons would also risk significant compensation claims from rights-holding TV broadcasters.
The European championships are usually held in one or two host nations, but the Euro 2020 tournament was spread around Europe in what organizers said was a “romantic one-off” event.
The host cities are Amsterdam; Baku; Bilbao, Spain; Bucharest; Budapest; Copenhagen; Dublin; Glasgow, Scotland; London; Munich, Germany; Rome; and St Petersburg, Russia.
RECORD DEFEAT: The Shanghai-based ‘Oriental Sports Daily’ said the drubbing was so disastrous, and taste so bitter, that all that is left is ‘numbness’ Chinese soccer fans and media rounded on the national team yesterday after they experienced fresh humiliation in a 7-0 thrashing to rivals Japan in their opening Group C match in the third phase of Asian qualifying for the 2026 World Cup. The humiliation in Saitama on Thursday against Asia’s top-ranked team was China’s worst defeat in World Cup qualifying and only a goal short of their record 8-0 loss to Brazil in 2012. Chinese President Xi Jinping once said he wanted China to host and even win the World Cup one day, but that ambition looked further away than ever after a
‘KHELIFMANIA’: In the weeks since the Algerian boxer won gold in Paris, national enthusiasm is inspiring newfound interest in the sport, particularly among women In the weeks since Algeria’s Imane Khelif won an Olympic gold medal in women’s boxing, athletes and coaches in the North African nation say national enthusiasm is inspiring newfound interest in the sport, particularly among women. Khelif’s image is practically everywhere, featured in advertisements at airports, on highway billboards and in boxing gyms. The 25-year-old welterweight’s success in Paris has vaulted her to national hero status, especially after Algerians rallied behind her in the face of uninformed speculation about her gender and eligibility to compete. Amateur boxer Zougar Amina, a medical student who has been practicing for a year, called Khelif an
Crowds descended on the home of 17-year-old Chinese diver Quan Hongchan after she won two golds at the Paris Olympics while gymnast Zhang Boheng hid in a Beijing airport toilet to escape overzealous throngs of fans. They are just two recent examples of what state media are calling “toxic fandom” and Chinese authorities have vowed to crack down on it. Some of the adulation toward China’s sports stars has been more sinister — fans obsessing over athletes’ personal lives, cyberbullying opponents or slamming supposedly crooked judges. Experts say it mirrors the kind of behavior once reserved for entertainment celebrities before
GOING GLOBAL: The regular season fixture is part of the football league’s increasingly ambitious plans to spread the sport to international destinations The US National Football League (NFL) breaks new ground in its global expansion strategy tomorrow when the Philadelphia Eagles and Green Bay Packers face off in the first-ever grid-iron game staged in Brazil. For one night only, the land of Pele and ‘The Beautiful Game’ will get a rare glimpse into the bone-crunching world of American football as the Packers and Eagles collide at Sao Paulo’s Neo Quimica Arena, the 46,000-seat home of soccer club Corinthians. The regular season fixture is part of the NFL’s increasingly ambitious plans to spread the US’ most popular sport to new territories following previous international fixtures
RSS