Still unexplained
The hunt for the origins of Covid-19 has for the past four years been a tangled web of politics, power struggles, and international finger-pointing.
FIFA has decided to extend the age limit for the players who will be participating in the football tournament of the rescheduled Tokyo Olympic Games.
The football competition in the Olympics is treated as an Under-23 tournament. But a new guideline set by FIFA on Friday will allow players born on or after January 1, 1997, to take part in the Games which were earlier scheduled to take place between July 23 and August 8, 2021.
It has been done after the International Olympic Committee (IOC) decided to retain all the already-qualified athletes in the next Games as well. Thus football players above the age of 24 will be allowed to play if their team have already qualified for the Olympics.
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Meanwhile, after due consideration between the IOC, International Paralympic Committee (IPC), Tokyo 2020 Organising Committee and Tokyo Metropolitian Government, the new dates – July 23 to August 8, 2021 – of the Summer Games were announced earlier this week.
An official statement from IOC also states that the Paralympic Games will now be held from 24 August to 5 September.
The COVID-19 pandemic has severely affected the sporting calendars across the world with football being the worst-hit. All major leagues and tournaments across the world, including the top five European leagues and the UEFA Champions League, have come to a standstill.
The Euro 2020 and the Copa America 2020, which were scheduled to be played in this year’s summer, have now been postponed due to the global crisis caused by the novel coronavirus which has already affected over 11 lakh people and killed more than 58,000 people.
FIFA on Saturday also cancelled the Under-17 Women’s World Cup and the Under-20 Women’s World Cup, scheduled to be played later this year in India and Panama/Costa Rica.
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