2019–20 in Belgian football
The following article is a summary of the 2019–20 football season in Belgium, which was the 117th season of competitive football in the country and ran from July 2019 until August 2020. National teams. Belgium national football team. After starting with four wins out of four during the previous season, Belgium continued its stroll through UEFA Euro 2020 qualifying Group I, also winning all remaining six matches and thereby qualifying for UEFA Euro 2020 with a perfect record. The tournament itself was however postponed to 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic in Europe. and both the  preparation matches against Portugal and Switzerland in March which were to be held in Qatar as well as two other matches in June against opponents which were still to be announced, were cancelled. UEFA Euro 2020. Belgium was to play Denmark, Finland and Russia in Group B in June 2020, however all matches were postponed to 2021. Friendlies. Four friendlies were to be played in preparation for the UEFA Euro 2020 tournament, the first two would have been played in March in Qatar against Portugal and Switzerland, while the two others were scheduled for June, with the opponents still unknown . Eventually, all matches were cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic in Europe. Belgium women's national football team. Qualification for the UEFA Women's Euro 2021 started perfect for the Belgians with four straight wins, with also Switzerland holding the maximum after four games. A few weeks before the crucial match between the joint-leaders, all remaining matches were postponed to the following season, due to the COVID-19 pandemic in Europe. The UEFA Women's Euro 2021 tournament was pushed back a year to become the UEFA Women's Euro 2021, to avoid coinciding with both the 2020 Summer Olympics  and UEFA Euro 2020. Meanwhile, the team did compete in the 2020 Algarve Cup, reaching 6th place out of 8 teams, while two other friendlies were cancelled. Belgium national under-21 football team. The U21 started their 2021 UEFA European Under-21 Championship qualifying campaign and were scheduled to play their first five matches. However the final match against Bosnia-Herzegovina was postponed to the following season due to COVID-19. Belgium national under-19 football team. The U19 took part in the 2020 UEFA European Under-19 Championship qualifying campaign. The team easily passed the qualifying round, moving into the elite round, before the  tournament was cancelled entirely and qualification was stopped. 2020 UEFA European Under-19 Championship qualification. Qualifying Round. <onlyinclude></onlyinclude> Elite Round. <onlyinclude></onlyinclude> Men's football. League season. Promotion and relegation. The following teams had achieved promotion or suffered relegation going into the 2019–20 season. Coronavirus impact & License troubles. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic in Belgium, all professional matches were postponed mid-March. A few weeks later the board of directors of the Belgian Pro League proposed to cancel permanently all remaining matches, take the standings as of March 12 counting as final and award the title to Club  Brugge, with the proposal to be accepted at the general meeting on 15 May 2020. UEFA criticized the decision to stop the competition early, threatening to not allow any Belgian clubs to take part in the 2020–21 UEFA Champions League and 2020–21 UEFA Europa League unless they tried everything possible to complete as many matches as possible before the extended deadline of early August. In the amateur leagues, all remaining matches were canceled as well, and points of teams that had played fewer matches were scaled up before completing the final standings, while all playoff matches were canceled and only  direct promotions and relegations were carried out. Despite stopping all matches in both the 2019–20 Belgian First Division A and 2019–20 Belgian First Division B, several unresolved issues remain, which were to be solved by a group of experts to come with a proposal by mid-May: The easiest solution would involve having no relegation and allowing both Oud-Heverlee Leuven and Beerschot to be promoted, playing one season with 18 teams without playoffs. Meanwhile, the 2020 Belgian Super Cup (scheduled to be played towards the end of July) could be canceled, with the cup final to be played on  that date instead. While many clubs seemed to support this proposal, no final consensus was reached in the months of March and April, as the general meeting was postponed several times. To complicate matters further, on 8 April 2020, the license commission decided not to award a professional football license to no less than seven (of 24) professional clubs, nearly always for insufficient proof of financial solvency. This included three teams from the 2019–20 Belgian First Division A (Standard Liège, Excel Mouscron and Oostende) and four from the 2019–20 Belgian First Division B (Lokeren, Lommel, Roeselare and Virton). All seven  clubs appealed the decision at the Belgian Court for Sports Arbitrage, but only Standard Liège, Excel Mouscron, Oostende, and Lommel were awarded a license while Lokeren went bankrupt and ceased to exist and both Roeselare and Virton were refused a license and thereby forced to relegate. As a result, there are only 21 professional teams left, meaning more than just one team will need to be promoted from the 2019–20 Belgian First Amateur Division. In that division, only had two teams received a professional football license (Deinze and RWDM47) at first instance, but eventually, the appeals of Seraing and Lierse  Kempenzonen were upheld, meaning there are four eligible teams. In the days before the decision by the general meeting, several clubs sent around their proposal with their vision on how the season should come to an end, with opinions differing hugely: UEFA competitions. Champions Genk qualified directly for the group stage of the Champions League, while runners-up Club Brugge started in the qualifying rounds. Cup winners KV Mechelen were banned from European football after being found guilty of match-fixing as part of the 2017–19 Belgian football fraud scandal, resulting in their place in the group stage of the  Europa League being taken by Standard Liège for finishing third in the league. Finally Antwerp and Gent started in the UEFA Europa League qualifying rounds after respectively finishing fourth and fifth. Managerial changes. This is a list of changes of managers within Belgian professional league football: