Czech Republic postpones decision on football season until April 30 at earliest

AFI | American Football | 04/17/2020

Graphic: Igor Lazarevic

The Czech Association of American Football, CAAF, (Česká Asociace Amerického Fotbalu) has put off making a decision on whether to play football in 2020 until the end of April.

And then they might delay again.

The CAAF had originally postponed the season which was scheduled to start on March 29, for a month due to the spread of the coronavirus, COVID-19. Like leagues in every other country in the world, with the situation changing almost daily and with governments planning to ease restrictions, the CAAF is holding out hope that they can salvage some form of a season.

Radim Kroulik, PR Director of the CAAF:

We are in the process of asking the teams to submit their opinions on different options. The next meeting of the Board is scheduled for the 29th of April. It is not certain we will make a final decision at that time given the circumstances. We are monitoring the situation that is constantly changing. Our Goverment will begin to lift some of the restrictions this Monday [April 20] and then almost every week after that so we don’t know what will happen with coronavirus after those restrictions are lifted.

I think it’s safe to say that there is a will to play some kind of football this year. However, just which leagues will play (men, U19) is a different question. There are a lot of unknowns and so we are kind of in “wait and see” mode.

Coronavirus situation in Czech Republic

A total of 6,437 cases of the coronavirus have been reported in the Czech Republic with 170 deaths attributed to COVID-19.

The Czech Republic was one of the swiftest countries in Europe to take action against the virus’s spread in March when cases start appearing throughout the continent. The country was among the first in Europe to declare a state of emergency – which parliament had extended to April 30 – and closed borders, schools, most shops and restaurants, and restricted people’s movement. However, this week the government has slowly begun an easing of restrictions and people in the Czech Republic can now shop at hardware and bicycle stores, play tennis and go swimming.