Matches postponed in the Premier League English football, basketball teams of the NBA decimated, preparation for the Australian Open tennis disrupted … The sport is not spared from the exponential increase in cases of Covid-19 linked to the omicron variant, and feels the threat of a new total door closure, or even a stoppage in competitions.
At French sports venues, the number of visitors will be limited to 2,000 people indoors and 5,000 outdoors as of next Monday and for a period of three weeks, as announced on Monday by French Prime Minister Jean Castex.
In the English championship, his sacrosanct “Boxing Day” (a day after Christmas) did not have its usual festive aspect, with three games postponed, including Liverpool-Leeds. Two matches on the 20th date, scheduled for Tuesday through Thursday, have already been added to that list.
The “Reds” manager, Jurgen Klopp, and his Leicester counterpart, Brendan Rodgers, agreed in criticizing the football schedule for the end of the year parties.
“Playing the 26th and then the 28th is not right. I say this because it is true and I think we can find solutions. It is not that difficult to play football in a slightly different way. On the 26th and the 29th, what would be the problem?” he mused.
In total, the Premier League was forced to postpone a dozen games in the last three dates, while Great Britain faces a record number of infections.
Also this Monday, the Premier League announced that between December 20 and 26, 103 positive cases of Covid-19 between players and club staff, a record number since the start of the tests in 2020.
Wales decided that all sporting events should be played behind closed doors. In Scotland the three-week winter break was brought forward: it started on Monday instead of January 3.
The other major European championships will resume between now and the first week of January, and could also be affected by the variant Omicron.
In Germany, where the Bundesliga Due to resume on January 7, all sports competitions, including football matches, will take place behind closed doors.
Waiting for Djokovic
Another potential victim is tennis. The Australian Open It is due to start on January 17 and three top players – Rafael Nadal, Andrey Rublev and Denis Shapovalov – announced that they had tested positive, casting doubt on their presence at the first Grand Slam of the year.
“Now I have to recover and I will only go to Melbourne when this is all safe for everyone,” Rublev said Monday on Twitter.
The world number one, the Serbian Novak Djokovic, which refuses to rule on whether or not he is vaccinated against Covid-19, will announce in principle before the end of the year whether or not he will be at the Australian Open. His environment has already advanced that he will not be at the ATP Cup (January 1-9) in Sydney, the first date of the year.
To be authorized to enter Australian territory, players and their technical teams must be vaccinated.
Alpine skiing is not being fought either: the American Mikaela Shiffrin, in charge of the Women’s World Cup, announced this Monday that she tested positive for the covid, and that is why she will miss the tests in Lienz (Austria), on Tuesday and Wednesday .
“I’m fine, but unfortunately I tested positive. I follow protocol and am in isolation,” wrote the Alpine ski star with 72 World Cup victories.
NBA and NHL in the storm
Cases of Covid-19 They have been multiplying for a few weeks in the women’s ski circuit, such as those starring Lara Gut-Behrami from Switzerland, Alice Robinson from New Zealand or Katharina Liensberger from Austria.
In the United States, the basketball championship, the NBA, goes ahead for now, but teams are decimated by Covid-19 cases, with 27 of the 30 franchises rocked by the pandemic, according to figures released Sunday for the North American championship.
The Atlanta Hawks are deprived of eleven of their men, the Celtics of nine. One consolation: the NBA allows teams to sign players who play in the reserve championship for short-term contracts to cover losses.
And the hockey championship On ice from the United States and Canada saw how the resumption after the Christmas break scheduled for Monday was postponed to Tuesday so that the NHL can analyze the results of the covid-19 tests.
The 14 matches scheduled for Monday were postponed, bringing to 67 the total number of matches rescheduled in the NHL this season due to Covid-19.
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Reference-www.eleconomista.com.mx