BEIJING—China says it will not stage any international sports for the rest of the year, apart from trials for the 2022 Winter Olympic Games in Beijing and the neighboring city of Zhangjiakou.
The order from the General Administration of Sports affects at least six Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) events, including the WTA Finals in Shenzhen in November. China also has four Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) tournaments lined up.
Shanghai was also due to host two big golf events, the men’s HSBC Champions, a World Golf Championship event two weeks after the Ladies Professional Golf Association Shanghai.
Xiamen was to host the Asian sport climbing championships in October, and Guangzhou the badminton World Tour Finals in December.
The decision puts paid to any chance of reviving Formula One’s Shanghai Grand Prix postponed in April, and affects two cycling stage races in October, the men’s Tour of Guangxi, and the women’s Tour of Chongming Island.
China has largely contained local transmission of the coronavirus but remains on guard for imported cases.
The General Administration of Sports cited “science and order” in issuing its plan to proceed on Thursday.
In the US, the Ivy League became the first Division I conference to suspend all fall sports, including football, leaving open the possibility of moving some seasons to the spring if the coronavirus pandemic is better controlled by then.
“We simply do not believe we can create and maintain an environment for intercollegiate athletic competition that meets our requirements for safety and acceptable levels of risk,” the Ivy League Council of Presidents said in a statement.
“We are entrusted to create and maintain an educational environment that is guided by health and safety considerations. There can be no greater responsibility—and that is the basis for this difficult decision.”
Though the coalition of eight academically elite schools does not grant athletic scholarships or compete for an NCAA football championship, the move could have ripple effects throughout the big business of college sports.
It was the Ivy League’s March 10 decision to scuttle its postseason basketball tournament that preceded a cascade of cancellations. All major college and professional sports were halted within days.
Football players in the Power Five conferences have already begun workouts for a season that starts on August 29, even as their schools weigh whether to open their campuses to students or continue classes remotely. More than a dozen prominent programs from Clemson to LSU to Oklahoma have reported positive tests among their athletes in the few weeks since voluntary workouts began. Some have temporarily shut down the workouts, incluidng Ohio State and North Carolina on Wednesday alone. AP