Sad news for Softball fans, especially in Europe. The organizers of the Haarlem Softball Week announced on Thursday that the 2009 tournament will be cancelled. The eleventh edition of the event was supposed to be held between June 23 and 28 for the first time since ten years. However the financial crisis also takes his toll on the Softball Week.
It is not the organizing committee itself, which has problems with the budget, but the invited teams, which mostly cannot afford the trip to Haarlem. Invitations were sent out to Japan, USA, Canada, Italy, China, Chinese Taipei, Venezuela and New Zealand. There was some interest in the beginning and the event was moved to June to accommodate a request by some teams, however besides host Netherlands, only Japan has already confirmed its participation, reports Marco Stoovelaar on his website. This led to the canceling of the tournament.