The Japanese American Football Association, NFA has announced that the X League has postponed the start of the season until October at the earliest.
Normally, X League regular-season games commence in late August.
The American Football Association of Japan (NFA) has abandoned the usual “opening in August” in response to the spread of the new coronavirus infection, and as an alternative, postponed the opening of the season until October and shortened the season as well. We will adopt the “scheduling schedule to be held” and start concrete preparations.
Currently, the world is taking various measures to prevent the spread of new types of coronavirus infections, and the NFA is putting the health and safety of everyone in the world and everyone involved in this association first, and to restore social activities to a normal state should be the highest priority.
In addition, in the current environment, the member teams have not been able to practice for the new season. This is normally performed from mid-February to mid-March but this along with the recruitment of new players has been delayed. In addition, we have not been able to start the team activities under the new system including new players.
Based on the above circumstances, it was considered appropriate to make an early decision on the cancellation of the official fall games normally held events and start specific preparations of an alternative plan.
We are confident that there will be unpredictable changes in the environment from today onward, but we will continue to make preparations while responding flexibly. We sincerely appreciate your understanding.
We look forward to the day when we will be able to overcome this difficult situation and meet you again at the stadium.
Coronavirus in Japan
As of March 25, Japan had recorded 15,968 cases of COVID-19 with 687 deaths. These numbers do not include the 712 people on the quarantined Diamond Princess cruise ship that was docked at Yokohama who had tested positive for the virus. A total of 14 people who were on the ship died as a result of the coronavirus.