The North American professional ice hockey league NHL is extending the Christmas break and is now completely interrupting the ice hockey season because of the many corona cases in the league.

One day after ruling out such a move, the NHL announced its U-turn in a statement on Monday evening (local time).

Accordingly, all 32 teams have to take a complete break from December 22nd to 25th, are not allowed to train and only travel again on December 26th or go on the ice from the afternoon.

For the interruption, the NHL canceled the five games scheduled on Thursday.

On Wednesday there was no game left anyway because of the cancellations of the past few days.

49 games already canceled

The number of canceled games since the start of the season has risen to 49. This makes it increasingly unlikely that the professionals from the world's best ice hockey league will take part in the Olympic Games.

The NHL had agreed with the players' union on a season break in February to enable stars such as the German national players Leon Draisaitl and Philip Grubauer to travel to China.

But if the risks as a result of the pandemic or the number of games to be caught up becomes too great, the league can withdraw from this commitment - and both now seem to be the case.

The last two remaining games on Tuesday should still take place, the only game on Monday evening was lost by the Minnesota Wild 4-7 against the Dallas Stars.

The Augsburg Nico Sturm remained without a goal participation for the game.

Even before the extended Christmas break, the NHL had ordered other teams to close their training facilities and canceled games.

The Columbus Blue Jackets and the Montreal Canadiens are no longer allowed to train as teams and will not do so until at least December 26th.

Therefore, there are no two games of the Blue Jackets against the Buffalo Sabers.

The games of the Canadiens had previously been canceled.

The New Jersey Devils game against the Pittsburgh Penguins scheduled for Tuesday (local time) will also not be played.