Euro 2020 Postponed Until 2021 Due to Coronavirus Pandemic

​This summer's European Championships have been postponed until 2021. 

The move from UEFA comes after a week of utter chaos across the sporting world, with all top-level football being postponed – and a similar situation being seen around other sporting leagues, including the NBA and MLB('s pre-season). 

Euro 2020 is one of the biggest sporting events to be postponed thus far, with the Tokyo Olympics later in the summer still hanging in the balance. 

The Norwegian FA were the first to break ranks on Tuesday afternoon, announcing that the tournament will now take place from 11 June - 11 July 2021. 

A later UEFA statement read: "UEFA today announced the postponement of its flagship national team competition, UEFA EURO 2020, due to be played in June and July this year. The health of all those involved in the game is the priority, as well as to avoid placing any unnecessary pressure on national public services involved in staging matches. The move will help all domestic competitions, currently on hold due to the COVID-19 emergency, to be completed.

"All UEFA competitions and matches (including friendlies) for clubs and national teams for both men and women have been put on hold until further notice. The UEFA EURO 2020 Play-off matches and international friendlies, scheduled for the end of March, will now be played in the international window at the start of June, subject to a review of the situation."

While the European football governing body denied last week that they were asked to move or cancel the tournament by any of their member FAs, Tuesday's decision does allow a degree of flexibility for various domestic leagues to conclude if they are put on hold in the short term. 

The vast majority of Europe's biggest leagues have taken the decision to cancel all games until the start of April at the earliest – a decision which would leave them unable to fit all of their remaining fixtures in between their best-case restart point and their nominal end of the season. 

The postponement of the summer's tournament should allow the Premier League, among other leagues, to extend their season into the month of June (and perhaps even July) while still allowing players time off before a fresh campaign begins in August. 

More details, presumably, will follow. 

For more from Chris Deeley, follow him on Twitter at @ThatChris1209!