The Vietnamese authorities have finally decided to postpone this year’s Southeast Asian Games due to high risk of Covid-19.
THE 2021 Southeast Asian (SEA) Games will not push through this year.
The decision was arrived at by the SEA Games Federation due to the rising Covid-19 cases in Vietnam, Philippine Olympic Committee (POC) president Abraham "Bambol" Tolentino said.
“The SEA Games Federation unanimously decided not to hold the SEA Games this year due to Covid-19,” said Tolentino during a virtual press conference.
"It's (Vietnam SEAG) just postponed to a later date but it's not cancelled. They want it to push through," Tolentino added.
The biennial regional meet, which is set to take place from November 21 to December 2, will be held next year with the federation giving Vietnam 10 days to decide on the new date.
Bambol said no specific date has been reached as to when the rescheduled SEA Games will take place, leaving the decision on Vietnam, but they are hoping to have it happen within the first half of next year.
“They want to hold the SEA Games for 2022 so they are choosing either March, April, or May,” Tolentino added as it should be pushing through within the first half of 2022 to prevent complications with the preparations of Cambodia of its hosting of the 2023 SEA Games as well as the Asian Games that is scheduled to take place in September of that year.
The Philippine Sports Commission (PSC) board will meet with Tolentino by next week to discuss the training of the various national teams according to Team PH chef de mission Ramon Fernandez.
“We’ll just have to find out first when the dates will be, and then we will go back to the drawing boards and talk to the NSAs on the minimum number of months they need to train for the event. We’ll play it by ear at this point.”
Tags: #Covid19, #Vietnam, #SEAGames, #internationalsports