Quattro Kawasaki team boss Pete Extance is 'gutted' the 2020 Isle of Man TT has been cancelled after he moved heaven and earth to sign legend John McGuinness for this year's festival.

Extance was looking forward to celebrating McGuinness' 100th TT race in June but understands that public health takes precedence.

“It’s fair to say today’s announcement took us all by surprise and we’re all absolutely gutted for everyone concerned with the event," Extance told bikesportnews.com.

"From our personal perspective, we’ve been working towards the TT since October and even this last week, we’ve had new carbon fibre bodywork arrive and a lot of time, effort and money has gone into the last few months and would so again between now and June. That’s a situation that all of the teams and riders would have been in.

“Quattro Plant have stood by us and signing John McGuinness was a terrific feather in our cap and we were all looking forward to his 100th TT race being with our little team from Bournemouth in the Superbike race so to miss that opportunity is hugely disappointing.

"It’s very difficult to say at this stage if everything we have in place now will still be the same this time next year.

“Of course, we fully understand the situation with the coronavirus and go along with the recommendations of the Isle of Man Government so all we can do is regroup and look towards 2021 where we can, hopefully, pick things up again.”