2020 Olympics officially postponed

This morning, the International Olympic Committee finally did the inevitable, taking an unprecedented step to officially postpone the 2020 Olympics, which were set to begin on July 24th. The postponement is due to concerns over the coronavirus outbreak that has brought the world to a screeching halt in the past week. IOC senior member Dick Pound said yesterday that postponement of the Olympics “had been decided.”

In recent days, several national olympic committees, Canada and Australia being among the first, had called on the IOC to postpone the Summer Games. The United States Olympic Committee did the same last night. After that, it was all but assured that the Olympic Games would be postponed.

The Olympics do not have a new date, but the IOC said it would take place no later than next summer, which would add to an already growing window of international sports competitions that include Euro 2021, the 2021 Copa América, the 2021 CONCACAF Gold Cup, and the 2021 FIFA Club World Cup. What is unclear is what happens to Olympic qualifying for the U-23s, which were supposed to be underway right now, and whether players who would have aged out of the competition after this year would still be allowed to compete next year. On the USWNT side, they must wait one more year to try and become the first team to win a Women’s World Cup and an Olympic gold medal back-toback.

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