United World Wrestling (UWW) President Nenad Lalovi? has said the upcoming Asian Olympic Qualifying Tournament, scheduled to take place in Chinese city Xi’an from March 27 to 29, could be cancelled due to the outbreak of coronavirus. “We will take a decision within 15 days.” said Lalovic. WrestlingTV had earlier reported on Tuesday that event is likely to be shifted out of China as is the case with most of the international sporting events scheduled in China for next 60 days.
“We are following the situation closely and we are in close contact with the Chinese federation and local authorities,” Lalovi? told Agence France-Presse.
The virus is now confirmed to have infected at least 4,500 people around the world and to have killed 106 in China. Several foreign governments with large numbers of citizens in Wuhan, the epicentre of the outbreak, are considering evacuations.
Lalovi? also said Kazakhstan, South Korea and Uzbekistan are already candidates to replace China if necessary. He added that Chinese wrestlers would have to spend a period “in quarantine” before competing.
If the event is called off, it would be the second wrestling qualifier for the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games to suffer the fate in quick succession.
The Oceania Wrestling Championships, set to have been held from Thursday (January 30) to Saturday (February 1) in American Samoa’s capital Pago Pago, were cancelled earlier this month due to the measles outbreak in neighbouring Samoa.
As reported by Radio New Zealand, the Organising Committee said the health concerns of athletes in American Samoa and those having to travel through Samoa, and changing entry permit requirements for travellers, were the key reasons for the decision made by UWW.
Asian Olympic Qualifiers – 2 Quota places were available in each category
India along with other top countries in Asia will vie for quota places at the Asian Olympic Qualifiers. Each of the 18 Olympic categories in Men Freestyle, Women Wrestling & Greco-Roman will make 2 quota places available to Tokyo 2020 hopefuls. India already has booked 4 quota places in for Tokyo.
Other sporting events on verge of cancellation Formula One’s Shanghai Grand Prix in April heads the list of high-profile international sporting events that are set to take place in China during the months before the coronavirus reaches its expected peak in early May. Wuhan, the city where the virus was first reported, has lost Olympic boxing qualifiers to Amman, Jordan, and the women’s football qualifying tournament first to Nanjing and now to Sydney. Further a field, Foshan, Guangdong province, has seen the Tokyo 2020 women’s basketball qualifiers moved to Belgrade, while Hainan has cancelled Top Rank’s debut boxing match in China fight. The Asian Indoor Athletics championships set for Hangzhou have also been cancelled. Cycling’s Tour of Hainan, which was scheduled for February 23 to March 1, has also been cancelled. The International Cycling Union said that it could be rescheduled later in the year. The diving World Series cancelled its China leg set for Beijing from March 7 to 9. Cornel Marculescu, president of the international swimming federation, told AFP on Monday that synchronised swimming’s China event, scheduled for Suzhou from April 23-25 is also in doubt.
