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OTTAWA – Covid-19 continues to have an impact on the international baseball calendar as the World Baseball Softball Confederation (WBSC) announced today that the 2020 Women’s Baseball World Cup has been postponed for the second time and is now scheduled for March 1-9, 2021 in Tijuana, Mexico.
The WBSC also announced postponements and new dates for the U-15 and U-23 Baseball World Cup events, both to take place in Mexico.
“Today’s difficult decision means that for the first time since the founding of the International Baseball Federation in 1938, we will have no official international baseball competitions in a calendar year,” said WBSC President Riccardo Fraccari in a news release. “We are especially disappointed for our athletes and National Federations, who were set to compete and shine in this year’s Baseball World Cups.”
The 2020 Women’s Baseball World Cup was originally scheduled to be played in Monterrey, Mexico in September but was forced into postponement due to Covid-19 and rescheduled for November 12-21 of this year.
The list of qualified nations for the event includes Canada, the No. 2 ranked women’s baseball team in the world, along with six-time defending world champions Japan (No. 1), host Mexico (No. 14), Australia (No. 6), Chinese Taipei (No. 3), Cuba (No. 8), Dominican Republic (No. 9), France (No. 18), Netherlands (No. 11), Philippines (No. 15), USA (no. 5) and Venezuela (No. 4).
Coming is off a bronze medal performance at the last Women’s Baseball World Cup in 2018 with a thrilling, extra-innings win over the United States and a silver medal finish at the 2016 event.
All-time, Canada has collected six medals (two silver, four bronze) at eight world cup events dating back to the inaugural tournament in 2004.
