What does coronavirus mean for upcoming international sports events in Australia?

In late March, Basketball Australia chief executive Jerril Rechter was preparing to fly to Geneva to meet with the board of Fiba, the game’s governing body. Rechter and three colleagues had tickets booked, bags packed and a pitch ready to sell Australia as the best possible host of the 2022 Women’s World Cup.

Just days before their flight, coronavirus-related travel restrictions rendered the trip impossible. Rechter and her team pivoted to video-conferencing, presenting late into the evening during Fiba’s first-ever virtual board meeting. They waited patiently as another nation outlined a competing bid, before re-joining the call to witness Fiba president Hamane Niang open an envelope that revealed Australia as the winner.

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In ordinary times, Australia securing the hosting rights for a major international tournament would be headline news. The Opals are currently the second best team in the world – 2006 world champions and three-time Olympic silver medallists. In 2022, they may well lift the World Cup on home soil. But amid the coronavirus turbulence, the announcement generated little buzz. Now, Rechter and her team must begin organising a major international event – no easy undertaking in usual circumstances – with society in lock-down and sport in chaos.

“This has provided a light on the hill – something to aim for once we are through this crisis,” Rechter tells Guardian Australia. “We are putting our heads down now and working on our project planning for the next year. While no one knows what is going to happen next, nothing is impossible. Four weeks ago, no one thought you could present a bid for one of the largest female sporting competitions in the world via Zoom. But we did.”

Basketball Australia is not the only domestic sporting body seeking to organise a world championships against the backdrop of coronavirus. In the short-term, the ICC Men’s Twenty20 World Cup is scheduled to begin in October across seven Australian cities. Cycling Australia is set to host the 2022 UCI Road World Championships, while Football Federation Australia is bidding together with New Zealand for the 2023 Fifa Women’s World Cup; a decision is due in June. Even with these extended lead-times, coronavirus poses a real threat.

“The big international events that we have in Australia are typically funded by government,” says Daryl Herbert, chairman of sports event promoter GTR Events. “Governments will be under extraordinary financial pressure to somehow rebalance their books.

“The other part of the funding model is corporate – broadcasting and sponsorships. Are companies going to be as comfortable as they would have been investing in these events, when they are all taking massive hits right now? I think it is going to be very difficult for the income models put in place pre-corona to be viable post-corona.”

The road cycling world championships in Wollongong are expected to cost $20m, with the vast majority to be provided by the New South Wales state government. While Cycling Australia is confident of its funding guarantees, general manager Kipp Kaufmann concedes that corporate dollars were now uncertain.

“Our government partners are fantastic,” he said. “We have no concerns – we are certain that the event will go forward. But sponsorship is one area of likely delay. Whereas we might usually be talking to companies right now, many of them might not be a position to have those conversations until next year.”

Even if government funding remains in place, wholesale reform of the sporting calendar will also raise question marks. “Does everyone get pushed back a year? Nothing is off the table,” says Herbert. “There are going to be winners and losers.” The major events veteran pointed to the road world championships – the 2020 edition is scheduled for Switzerland in September, while 2021 is set to take place in Belgium.

“I don’t see any chance of having a world champs this year in Switzerland,. Does that get pushed back a year? Or to 2022? Or 2023? There is going to be clash upon clash upon clash. Across the sporting calendar, there will be massive dislocation. The compression will mean more events in less time and with less money.”

Cycling Australia, Basketball Australia and FFA all indicated their desire to be flexible. “There are so many unknowns right now for everyone – so it is hard to guess what might happen,” says Kaufmann. “I think by 2022 things will be sorted out and those [announced dates] will be the dates – but if not, we will work closely with all our partners and the UCI to make changes.”

Beset by these challenges, organising major international sporting events in the months ahead will not be smooth sailing. But if the cycling world championships, basketball World Cup and football World Cup do take place as scheduled in the post-coronavirus era, each could offer Australia a symbolic representation of our collective triumph over adversity.

“These are the moments where the power of sport is on display,” says Basketball Australia’s Rechter. “We don’t know what things will look like on the other side of coronavirus. But sport can bring people together and show them what is possible in ways that are incredibly inspiring.”

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For Kaufmann, the prospect for world class racing on the roads around Wollongong, broadcast across the globe, is enticing. “New South Wales has been devastated in recent months first with the bushfires and now with coronavirus,” he says. “It will be absolutely perfect timing for us to welcome the world.”

FFA too is buoyant about the benefits a successful bid would bring. “Football will play a huge part in helping Australia, New Zealand and the Asia-Pacific region in their recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic,” an FFA spokesperson said. “Hosting the Fifa Women’s World Cup would be a much-needed and massive economic, sporting, social and cultural boost to both nations at that time.”

After months without sport in 2020, the years ahead could be a bonanza of sporting spectacles. “People will want to watch and participate – because it has been taken away from them,” says Herbert. “The appetite will be extraordinary.”