Chinese Basketball Association demands early return from US stars to resume season: Report
The Chinese Basketball Association has reportedly told American players to return for the end of the season or face serious consequences. Read on for details.
Officially declared as a pandemic, the outbreak of coronavirus is worsening with every single day passing. Sporting leagues around the world have largely been affected due to the outbreak. Amidst such circumstances, the Chinese Basketball Association or widely known as the CBA are reportedly contemplating an early return to action for the second half of the season.
When the league entered its holiday period during the Lunar New Year in late January, most of the foreign players returned to their homes. However, with the coronavirus outbreak in China, the league failed to resume on its scheduled date leading to further delay.
Chinese Basketball Association plans early return to season
Last week, positive signs emerged regarding the containment of the virus. This is put the Chinese Basketball Association into action with ESPN reporting the league plans to resume the season by early April. The report states that CBA team officials are discussing several formats for how to resume play.
Close to 40 Americans including former NBA players like Jeremy Lin, Lance Stephenson and Ty Lawson play for teams in the CBA. It is further reported the Chinese Basketball Association has told American players to plan to return as early as this weekend and prepare for the league to resume in early April. American players have reportedly been informed that they will be required to spend 14 days in quarantine upon their return to China.
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Chinese Basketball Association's memo to its teams
ESPN released a memo that Chinese Basketball Association sent to its teams that read 'According to the requirements of national epidemic prevention and control, we postponed the subsequent games of the 2019-2020 CBA season scheduled to be held on February 1. At present, the situation of epidemic prevention and control in CBA cities is basically stable. In order to better respond to the national requirements on precise prevention and control, solid and orderly promotion of a return to work and production, shoulder the mission and task of sports confidence, warm people's hearts and gather people's hearts, according to the relevant requirements of China Basketball Association on the restart of the league, the rest of the games of the 2019-2020 CBA season will restart from the beginning of April.'
The released memo further requests all clubs to resume training as early as April 2. While the memo fails to provide details of the restart, it strictly urged all teams to comply with the 'requirements of the national and local epidemic prevention and control departments'.
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American players in limbo after Chinese Basketball Association demands early restart
Contrastingly, multiple reports in the US state the American players are reluctant in boarding a plane to China until the outbreak is contained further. The country itself has issued a travel ban to China and most of Europe in order to keep the coronavirus outbreak away from American citizens.
Former Toronto Raptors and now Beijing Ducks star Jeremy Lin took to Instagram back in February to express his confusion over the fate of the current CBA season.
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Published By : Sujay Chakraborty
Published On: 12 March 2020 at 10:48 IST