The European Athletics Council today (8) confirmed that the European Athletics U18 Championships, scheduled to take place from 16 to 19 July this year in Rieti, Italy, but postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, will be rescheduled for 2021 at a date still to be confirmed.
Meeting via video conference on Thursday 7 and Friday 8 May, the Council also decided that the second edition of The Match, the innovative new team competition that pitted Europe v USA whose first edition was held in Minsk, Belarus in 2019, and which was originally scheduled again for Minsk next year, is now cancelled.
The main reason behind this decision was the crowded athletics calendar in 2021 following the postponement of the Olympics Games Tokyo 2020 to 2021. The next edition of The Match is now slated to take place in 2023 in the United States.
In regards to other European Athletics events, the postponed European Throwing Cup is now confirmed for next year in Leiria, Portugal, and for a three-year cycle from 2021 to 2023, this year’s cancelled European 10,000m Cup is confirmed for 2021 in London, Great Britain and the European Mountain Running Championships, that was postponed this year, will take place in 2021 in the same location in Cinfaes, Portugal.
Commenting on the Council decisions taken at the two-day meeting, interim President Dobromir Karamarinov said:
“I am very pleased to announce that this year’s European Athletics U18 Championships in Rieti, Italy, that we had to postpone due to the COVID-19 outbreak, will now take place in Rieti in 2021. The Council felt strongly that in these difficult times it was important to support this age category and give them the opportunity to compete with their peers from across Europe at the very highest level. We also wanted to send our support to the local organising committee in Rieti and to Italy which has been so badly affected by this coronavirus outbreak.
“It is also important in these difficult times that we send a strong signal to all athletes and the wider athletics community, that our sport must continue and that we are still planning on hosting our championships for them to compete in.”
Finally the audited accounts for the financial year 2019 were presented and approved by the Council.