At least 2 MLB games postponed due to Marlins’ virus outbreak
MIAMI – The Miami Marlins scrambled for roster replacements as they coped with a coronavirus outbreak. The New York Yankees had an unscheduled day off in Philadelphia while the home team underwent COVID-19 tests. The Baltimore Orioles were flying home from Miami without playing a game. The Chicago White Sox manager was sidelined by a cough.
And Washington Nationals manager Dave Martinez summed up the situation in a season barely underway.
“I’m going to be honest with you: I’m scared,” Martinez said.
Two major league games scheduled for Monday night were postponed after more than a dozen Marlins players and staff members tested positive for COVID-19 in an outbreak that stranded the team in Philadelphia.
The Marlins’ home opener against Baltimore was called off, as was the Yankees’ game at Philadelphia. The Yankees would have been in the same clubhouse the Marlins used last weekend.
Nine Marlins players on the 30-man roster, two taxi squad players and two staff members tested positive, a person familiar with the situation told The Associated Press, speaking on condition of anonymity because the results hadn’t been publicly disclosed.
The Yankees are staying in Philadelphia and have their own clubhouse staff with the team there, the person said. The Marlins postponed their flight home Sunday night after
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NEW YORK – CONCACAF is changing its World Cup qualifying hexagonal to an octagonal in response to the coronavirus pandemic and delaying the start until next June.
The United States, Mexico, Costa Rica, Jamaica and Honduras receive byes directly to the octagonal, the Confederation of North, Central American and Caribbean Association Football announced Monday.
CONCACAF’s other 30 nations will compete for three additional spots in the final round. The octagonal will take place with four games per team in next June’s double FIFA international match window followed by two apiece in September, October and November 2021, and two each in January and March 2022.
By staying with a large total of teams in the final round, CONCACAF ensured two high-profile, lucrative qualifiers between the U.S. and Mexico. The format also provides margin for slip-ups, though there were not enough to prevent the U.S. from missing the 2018 World Cup in Russia when it lost to Mexico and Costa Rica at home and at Trinidad and Tobago on the final night.
“It’s good that we have clarity regarding the format and scheduling, which allows us to chart the course ahead,” U.S. coach Gregg Berhalter said in a statement. “We are looking forward to the challenge that this new World Cup qualifying format will present.”
The hexagonal was to have started this September and be based on the June FIFA rankings, in which El Salvador was just ahead of Canada as the region’s sixth team. Teams not in the hexagonal would have competed to face the fourth-place team in the hex for the right to represent CONCACAF in an intercontinental playoff.
Hugo Carrillo, president of the Salvadoran federation, sent a letter to CONCACAF president Victor Montagliani stating “total and complete disapproval and disagreement” of the decision, and asked for reconsideration to keeping the old format.
FIFA removed the September 2020 window for international matches because of the pandemic. If the October and November 2020 windows take place, the U.S. could have exhibitions in Europe.
Under the new format, nations currently ranked 6-35 will be drawn into six groups of five in a seeded draw next month, with El Salvador, Canada, Curaçao, Panama, Haiti, and Trinidad and Tobago seeded. Each group will compete in a single round robin of four matches per nation this October and November.
Group winners will advance to a home-and-home, total-goals second round next March, and the second-round winners will advance to the octagonal.
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