Postpones, withdrawals and much more! Sports Fraternity seems disturbed due to Corona outbreak

New Delhi, March 06: The corona virus deaths tale of more than 3,300 across the globe is fearing. While 31 of those are reportedly from India, business, transport, communication, entertainment seems affected, so has sports! Corona outbreak has made six Indian shuttlers to step back from the All England Open Badminton Championships starting from March 11, that will be attended by 30,000 people. The players include HS Prannoy, Chirag Shetty, Satwiksairaj Rankireddy, Manu Attri, Sumeeth Reddy, and Sameer Verma.

 

The tournament which is the season's first World Tour Super 1000, is one of the qualifiers for the Tokyo Olympics. However, top shuttlers like PV Sindhu, Kidambi Srikanth, and Sai Praneeth have decided to participate in this event despite the virus threat.

 

 

The other team that has suffered because of this epidemic is the Indian Archery team. Returning from their five-month suspension to the upcoming Asia Cup world ranking tournament in Bangkok, the Archery Association of India (AAI) has announced its team's withdrawal too. The tournament which was to be held from March 8 would have marked India's first international competition since their suspension.

 

“After reviewing the current alarming situation on account of coronavirus and taking into consideration the travel advisories issued by SAI and IOC, Archery Association of India is worried about the health of our team and cannot take any risk under the circumstances,” AAI assistant secretary Gunjan Abrol wrote to World Archery secretary general Tom Dielen.

 

 

“As you are aware the AAI always sends its teams to all the events conducted at Bangkok without fail and this time also we were much like to be a part of this event. All the pre-departure arrangements were made to fly on 7 March but unfortunately, we are compelled to take this hard decision against our wish,” it added.

 

On the other hand, the Athlete Federation of India has issued an advisory to athletes, coaches, coaches and support staff amid the outbreak of coronavirus. The committee has firmly advised that athletes should not be allowed to go out of the camps and attend any private and public functions.

 

Due to a rapidly developing health emergency with increasing travel difficulties between countries and potential uncertainty arising, the 11-day ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup Challenge League A has been postponed, the International Cricket Council stated. The second series of the event was set to begin on 16 March in Malaysia. It had involved teams from Canada, Denmark, Malaysia, Qatar, Singapore, and Vanuatu. The event will probably be conducted in the second half of 2020.

 

 

ICC Head of Events, Chris Tetley said, “We have made the difficult decision to postpone the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup Challenge League A due to the Coronavirus outbreak. We have been monitoring the situation very closely and have concluded that the best course of action is to postpone the event owing to the increasing travel difficulties between countries and the potential uncertainty around teams returning home.

 

Corona outbreak has also forced the Indian women's hockey team to cancel their tour of China, leaving the federation with the difficult task of finding an opponent to compete with as part of its preparation for the Olympics. However, now, the Tokyo Olympics held from 24 July to 9 August 2020, will involve international travel of tens of thousands of athletes, officials, news media members, and spectators where India will be sending 64 athletes in 6 sports.