Today marks one year to go to the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games Opening Ceremony, and the WBSC joined the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the Organising Committee to celebrate the milestone.
In 365 days, baseball and softball will make their historic official Olympic return, where they are expected to be amongst the most popular sporting events at the Tokyo 2020 Games in Japan.
The IOC launched the #StrongerTogether campaign, highlighted with a video showcasing the solidarity and unity of the OlympicMovement, and including historic and inspirational imagery of past Olympic Games, Flame moments and epic Olympic athletes performances.
Under the motto: “Tokyo 2020 Plus 1", the Oganising Committee held a series of activities to celebrate the day. The main event in Tokyo took place at the Olympic Stadium, where the Japanese Olympic Swimmer, IKEE Rikako presented a speech conveying a message of respect and gratitude to all those supporting the Games and to athletes aiming to participate in next year’s Olympic Games.
As part of the celebration, the Tokyo Skytree (a broadcasting and observation tower in Japan’s capital) also showed two messages of “together we can all win” and a special message marking one year to the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games.
WBSC President Riccardo Fraccari also joined the occasion with a personal message highlighting the historic baseball-softball return to the Olympic Games.
Road to Tokyo - Softball
A year ago today, the specific Olympic softball qualification process began with the opening of the WBSC Softball Europe/Africa Olympic Qualifier in Utrecht, the Netherlands. Japan and USA had already qualified for Tokyo 2020 as the host nation and world champion, respectively. The Olympic Qualifier in Utrecht was the first of three specific qualification events, the Americas Qualifier was held in August in Surrey, Canada; and the Asia/Oceania Qualifier was played in September in Shanghai, China.
Road to Tokyo - Baseball
Four teams have already qualified: the host nation Japan, Israel, the winner of the Europe/Africa Qualifier, Korea and Mexico, the top-seeded National Teams from Asia and the Americas in the WBSC Premier12 2019.
The last two participants will earn their spots through the Americas and the Final Qualifier, which after being postponed in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, are expected to be scheduled in early 2021.
