Coronavirus outbreak could lead to 47% of sports events to be cancelled in 2020: Report

The ongoing coronavirus pandemic across the globe means most of the economic sectors are deeply affected. Sports being one of the major sectors is also expected to be heavily impacted by the lockdown. A new report from a sports marketing agency suggests only 53% of the sporting events will take place in 2020 due to the coronavirus outbreak.

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Two Circles, a US-based sports marketing agency that specialises in data-driven analytics, released their report on Monday where there projected the number of sporting events to take place in 2020. According to their projection, only 26,424 events will take place as scheduled between January to December 2020. This is a 47% reduction in their original projection which had around 49,803 events taking place in the calendar year.

The date delves deeper into the number of events taking place every month in 2020. According to the analysis, events between March and August will be the most affected due to the lockdown. March has already seen only about 1800 events taking place as opposed to the projected 4,246. Meanwhile, the period between April and June will have only 176 events taking place. The expected number of events is close to 16,000 events.

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Less number of events will have a direct impact on the revenue generated as Two Circles project global sports industry will generate only $73.7 billion revenue in 2020 as opposed to the earlier projected $135.3 billion. Due to the interruption of live sports from March 2020, the sports industry will take almost take a 46% hit in its revenue. In 2019, the global sports industry generated a revenue of $129 billion. 

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While these are just numbers forecasting the fate of the sports industry in 2020, the financial repercussions due to the lockdown have already been seen among the major sports league across the world. Last month a report suggested, the NBA could lose 'hundreds of millions' in revenue due to the pandemic. The other sports leagues in the US - MLB, NHL, NFL and MLS are also bracing for a major financial meltdown.

NBA and NHL were forced to suspend their ongoing seasons while MLB delayed the start of their 2020 season. The NFL was equally affected by the coronavirus outbreak as NFL Draft 2020 and the offseason were shifted to a virtual format.

In Europe, the conditions remain more or less similar to the US as the Premier League in England, Serie A in Italy, as well as LaLiga in Spain, repeatedly make the news with reports of their projected losses. Most Formula One racing events of 2020 were cancelled or postponed due to the outbreak. Even Tokyo Olympics 2020 was forced to be postponed for an indefinite period.

Earlier this month, Dr Anthony Fauci, the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, claimed sports will return at some point in the summer. However, as of now, the fate of the sports leagues across the globe remains unknown.