Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, March 23, 2020: Following last week’s announcement that the Badminton World Federation was suspending all HSBC BWF World Tour and other BWF-sanctioned tournaments from Monday, March 16 until Sunday, April 12, a further five tournaments have also been cancelled or postponed.
The five include the three Continental Confederation championships scheduled for week 17 on the BWF Tournament Calendar – one of the last chances for athletes to gain qualification for Tokyo 2020 before the April 26 deadline.
Badminton Asia has decided to postpone the Badminton Asia Championships 2020, due to be held in Manila from April 21-26. They had already been relocated from Wuhan, China. Manila also hosted the Badminton Asia Team Championships last month.
The escalation of the COVID-19 outbreak globally has led the BWF, in close consultation and consensus with its Continental Confederations and Host Member Associations, to confirm the suspension of these tournaments.
The five tournaments were slated to be played within the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games qualifying period, but will no longer contribute to Olympic qualifying as they will now fall outside the qualification window.
BWF will make a further announcement on any implications related to the Olympic qualification period at a later date.
*BWF can also confirm that the TOTAL BWF Thomas and Uber Cup Finals 2020 to be staged in Aarhus, Denmark, from May 16-24 has been postponed until August 15-23, 2020.
*BWF has also been forced to move the BWF Members’ Forum and AGM 2020. Both are key events on the BWF calendar and will now take place on August 20-21 in Aarhus.