Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on sports

This article needs to be updated. Please help update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information. (March 2024)

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The COVID-19 pandemic caused the most significant disruption^[1] to the worldwide sporting calendar since World War II. Across the world and to varying degrees, sports events were cancelled or postponed.^[2][3][4] The 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo were rescheduled to 2021.^[1] At the time, spectators had no games to watch and players no games to play.^[5] Only a few countries and territories—such as Hong Kong,^[1] Turkmenistan,^[6] Belarus, and Nicaragua—continued professional sporting matches as planned.^[7]