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Sam Kerr of Australia is expected to feature for the Matildas in Tokyo 2020 women’s football qualifiers moved to Sydney from China. Photo: Nike
SportChina

Coronavirus disrupts Tokyo 2020 qualifiers, Asian indoor athletics champs and tennis’ Fed Cup

  • Women’s Olympic football moved to Sydney, while Kazakhstan to host Fed Cup tennis group stage
  • Speculation surrounds start of Chinese Super League and World Indoor Athletics champions set for Nanjing in March
Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games
Jonathan White
Jonathan White
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The Asian Football Confederation is the latest sporting body to react in the face of China’s deadly coronavirus outbreak.

After first announcing that the Tokyo 2020 women’s football qualifiers would be moved from Wuhan, the city at the heart of the outbreak, to Nanjing, it has now been decided to relocate the qualifiers to Australia.

Sydney will now host the games between China, Taiwan, Vietnam and Australia from February 3 to 9.

The AFC Champions League play-off between Shanghai SIPG and Thai side Buriram United will take place in Shanghai as planned on Tuesday but behind closed doors.
That decision by the Chinese FA came after consultations with the AFC, the teams and the local FA.
“Considering that novel coronavirus cases have appeared in many places of our country, and in order to reduce cross infection from crowd gathering, Chinese Football Association, after consultation with the Asian Football Confederation, competing teams and Shanghai Football Association, decided that the match will be held as scheduled without spectators,” the CFA said in a statement on Saturday.
China's Tang Jiali (right) vies for the ball with Taiwan's Chang Chi-lan during the East Asian Football Federation E-1 Football Championship women's match between Taiwan and China in Busan on December 17, 2019. Photo: AFP
The CFA also announced the postponement of the Super Cup between Chinese Super League champions Guangzhou Evergrande and cup winners Shanghai Shenhua, which had been scheduled for February 5 in Suzhou. No new date has been announced.

Chinese clubs have also asked the AFC if they can play their first AFC Champions League games away from home, according to ESPN Philippines.

This, following the Chinese Basketball Association's decision to postpone its post-Lunar New Year return from February 1 to an unspecified date, has led to speculation as to whether the CSL season will start on February 22 as planned.
Hong Kong superstar boxer Rex Tso Sing-yu was scheduled to fight in Wuhan. Photo: Winson Wong

The Asian Athletics Association on Sunday announced that it had cancelled the indoor championships scheduled for Hangzhou on February 12 and 13.

Sunday also saw the postponement of the 14th Chinese National Winter Games, which were to be held across Inner Mongolia from February 16 to 26. Some events, such as women’s ice hockey and biathlon, were postponed on Saturday when they were meant to start.

The Fed Cup tennis qualifying event followed, with the Asia/Oceania group one event moving from Dongguan, Guangdong on February 4-8, to Nur-Sultan in Kazakhstan on the same dates.

Christian Coleman of the US celebrates winning the men's 60m at the 2018 World Indoor champs. Photo: Reuters

A number of sporting events have already been postponed, including Olympic boxing qualifiers in Wuhan from February 3-14 and Top Rank’s boxing tournament debut in Hainan province on February 2. No new venue has been announced for those Olympic qualifiers.

The China Automobile and Motor Sports Federation announced last Thursday that the 2020 edition of the China Changbai Mountain Ice and Snow Rally, originally to be held from February 12 to 14 in Jilin province, was suspended.

That statement on their website also said that there were instructions from the General Administration of Sport to “suspend all sporting events until April”. While widely reported, that has not yet happened across the board.

Hong Kong Lunar New Year Cup cancelled over coronavirus fears

More events are expected to be affected as the virus spreads. China is scheduled to host the women’s Olympic basketball qualifiers in Foshan, Guangdong, later this month.

Doubts are also growing over the likelihood of Nanjing hosting the World Indoor Athletics championships in March.

This article appeared in the South China Morning Post print edition as: Virus fears disrupts events on mainland
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