The draw for this summer’s Olympic women’s softball qualifying tournament – which will be hosted in South Surrey – is set to be announced Monday.
On Monday morning, the World Baseball Softball Confederation will make the announcement from its headquarters in Lausanne, Switzerland. The WBSC event will also be live-streamed during a media event set for Softball City.
Surrey was selected as the bid city for the week-long tournament – officially called the 2019 Americas Olympic Qualifier – back in January, though the selection announcement was delayed numerous times. Surrey’s bid committee chairperson, Greg Timm, originally announced that the city would bid on the event at the conclusion of the 2018 Canada Cup tournament last July.
Twelve teams – from North, South and Central America, as well as the Caribbean – will take part in the qualifier tournament, which is scheduled for Aug. 25-Sept. 1.
The United States will not be among the dozen teams taking part, as they have already qualified for the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, but Canada will be among the teams taking part.
Two Olympic berths will be up for grabs.
In comparison to the Canada Cup – which features many more teams, including youth squads – Timm described the Olympic qualifier succinctly, when speaking to Peace Arch News last year: “Smaller tournament, higher stakes.”
“When you have the Olympic rings flying in your city because it’s an official IOC event, it’s got a certain elevated sense of importance to it,” he said at the time.
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