The Dutch Gymnastics Federation has announced they will not send gymnasts to the upcoming WAG and MAG Championships in Mersin, Turkey. The federation is looking into options to host a local competition for the national team members to provide them with a competition opportunity.
More and more countries are opting to skip the competition since the second wave of the pandemic is progressing in Europe and the championships will no longer server as an Olympic qualifier. Armenia, Germany, and Great Britain all announced they would not participate in the competition earlier this month. In the updated list of definitive registrations for the competition, Spain and Norway are also marked among the countries who withdrew from both WAG and MAG competitions and Ireland withdrew from the WAG Euros but is still on the list for MAG Euros.
We are likely to see more countries withdraw in the coming weeks, especially since the competition is supposed to take place only five months before the 2021 European Championships in Basel. The 2021 Euros will be an Olympic qualifier and countries might want to focus on the preparation for that competition. Russian RG and Armenian MAG representatives also cited potential financial losses among the reasons for skipping the respective Euros. The directives published by the European Gymnastics Federation outline that delegations are not guaranteed reimbursement of their costs in case the events will be canceled and also have to buy additional insurance that covers COVID-19 because the current insurance that the FIG members have does not cover it.
