The Badminton World Federation plans to resume the World Tour with the Taipei Open Super 300 meet on September 1 and have announced new dates for five of the nine tournaments which were suspended following the disruptions caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.
The India Open Super 500 event is now scheduled to be held from December 8-13 while the BWF World Tour Finals have been pushed back by a week to December 16-20, 2020. However, the revised schedule is subject to safety clearances, the BWF said in a release on Friday.
“It has been a difficult task to plan for badminton’s return. It is a condensed calendar but we are confident this provides the framework to allow us to start again when it is safe and logistically possible,” BWF Secretary General Thomas Lund was quoted as saying in the release.
“At this point in time, it is difficult to predict when international movement and entry restrictions will be lifted by individual countries and territories, but we will not resume competition unless it is absolutely clear that is safe to do so.
“The health, safety and well being of all athletes, their entourage, officials and the greater badminton community remains our No 1 priority,” he added.
BWF also said that it was still working on a model for unfreezing world rankings in a staggered way to avoid any extreme drop off points that would affect the ranking structure for a player.
The apex body was also considering changes to the mandatory player regulations in the wake of the revamped tournament schedule and the possible changes to Olympic and Paralympic qualifying.