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TOKYO: Badminton number one Kento Momota tested positive for coronavirus on Sunday (Jan.3), prompting the withdrawal of all Japan players from this month’s Thailand Open, the Japan Badminton Association said.
“Momota has tested positive for the coronavirus and the association has decided not to send any players, including Momota, to Thailand,” an association official told AFP.
Momota was looking to make his international comeback in Bangkok after nearly a year after a car accident that left him seriously injured.
National broadcaster NHK said the 26-year-old tested positive at Narita airport before the Japanese team left for Thailand.
An association official confirmed that none of the other 22 players from Japan tested positive, but said the entire team would withdraw anyway.
Momota won the All-Japan championship last week in his first competition since his accident last January, when the vehicle taking him to the airport after winning the Malaysian Masters crashed and killed the driver.
Momota feared that his career might end after fracturing his eye socket in the accident and admitted that his “spirit nearly broke” after undergoing surgery.
The rescheduled Thailand Open is one of three tournaments to be held in Thailand this month, following disruptions to the badminton world tour schedule last year.
READ: Momota, world number one badminton, came back from a car accident with a win
Tokyo reported 816 new daily cases of COVID-19 on Sunday, a day after governors of the capital and neighboring prefectures called on the Japanese government to announce a state of emergency to combat a recent surge in cases.
Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga has resisted calls for a second state of national emergency; the government first introduced such a measure in April during an earlier wave of the pandemic. Suga is scheduled to speak publicly on January 4.
Japan’s Health Ministry said on Sunday there were 3,045 new confirmed cases of COVID-19 across the country.
Since the start of the pandemic, Japan has reported more than 240,000 cases of the new coronavirus and 3,548 deaths, according to the Ministry of Health.
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