Badminton Asia Championships postponed due to COVID-19 pandemic

The Badminton Asia Championships has been postponed due to COVID-19.
By Ivan Saldajeno

MANILA--The Badminton Asia Championships is among the badminton events that were affected by the Badminton World Federation's decision to postpone all its scheduled events for the next two months. The BWF arrived at the decision following the growing pandemic of the novel coronavirus.

"The health, safety and well-being of all athletes, their entourage, officials and the greater badminton community is the top priority," the federation said in a statement.

Initially scheduled to take place in Wuhan, the "ground zero" of COVID-19, the Philippines got the hosting rights due to the situation in the said city by the time the venue change was made.

But with the latest ruling, the said tournament, supposed to take place from April 21-26, has been pushed to a still to be determined later set of dates.

The Badminton Asia Championships is among the last tournaments that serve as qualifiers for the Tokyo Olympics, and with the said tourney lasting until the cut-off date for Olympic qualifying, this could factor a lot on whether the quadrennial meet will push through or not.

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