Ghost scenes and existential worries
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That was the sport year 2020
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Info chronology of sport in 2020
Foto: AP / Damian Dovarganes
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Berlin Thomas Müller sums it up: “You don’t want to get used to it.” Games without spectators, standstill. No income. The sport in the Corona claw. What could have been a spectacular year of sport is becoming an emergency program with long-term consequences.
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It was to be the year of the biggest ever football championship with twelve hosts. The year of an Olympic festival of records shortly afterwards in Tokyo. Athletes on the hunt for titles and medals and millions of spectators in the stadiums, on the tracks, in the halls. The 2020 sports calendar promised highlights at the beginning of the year with almost no respite. Formula 1 wanted to travel the world on a record course over 22 stations, and ice and snow sports enthusiasts wanted to gain momentum for the 2022 Winter Games in Beijing.
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It turned out differently, very differently. 2020 was also a practical test of unimaginable proportions for sport, in Germany and worldwide, at the top and in breadth. The corona crisis has partly led sport to its limits of existence – long-term damage as well as infections with the Sars-CoV-2 virus are not foreseeable.
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The complaints about the expected heat at the Tokyo games look almost ridiculous in retrospect. Discussions about the tension in the Bundesliga, in which Bayern were allowed to raise the championship trophy after Hansi Flick took office, also. The fact that Munich had to celebrate in front of empty ranks after a week-long lockdown and the season did not end until the end of June was also evidence of the exceptional situation in 2020.
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After the infection rate from Wuhan in China accelerated worldwide in February and turned into a pandemic, it gradually hit sport as well. The Bundesliga had to take a two-month break from mid-March. The Champions and the Europa League were played to the end in August in final tournaments.
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2020 – a year for many to forget. But the aftermath will continue. Cheering spectators in full arenas, fear-free emotions without a mask and corona endurance tests – the return to normal sports is open.
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