UPDATE: The Indian Premier League Governing Council (IPL GC) and Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) in an emergency meeting has unanimously decided to postpone IPL 2021 season with immediate effect.
IPL 2021 season postponed after multiple COVID-19 cases. The announcement came after SRH’s wicketkeeper-batsman Wriddhiman Saha tested positive for COVID-19 along with DC veteran spinner Amit Mishra. Earlier on Monday, CSK bowling coach L Balaji along with KKR bowlers Sandeep Warrier and Varun Chakravarthy had also returned positive results.
The suspension comes after 29 matches into the season.
In this thread, we will share IPL updates and updates on player’s safe return back home.
One franchise in particular took the matter up with the BCCI and said “You can host it after three months, five months, six months. It doesn’t matter. But right now, it needs to stop”.
Broadcasters Star India – who have the biggest stakes in this cricketing extravaganza – too are learnt to be in favour of the tournament being postponed for now.
On Monday night, after players and officials from KKR and CSK had tested positive, along with ground staff in Delhi and Chennai, the BCCI was busy finalising shifting the IPL to Mumbai and cancelling Kolkata and Bangalore as venues.
However, Tuesday’s developments have changed the script once again. As TOI reported, along with Saha, there was also news of Delhi Capitals’ Amit Mishra testing positive, which essentially means that the virus has entered four different franchise bio-bubbles.
With franchises panicking and fear gripping the players and their families who are in a bubble that’s being breached with every passing hour, cricket is the last thing on anybody’s mind.
“And now, the overseas players too want to go home. They’re clear they can’t take this anymore. And it’s understandable why they’re thinking that way,” say those tracking developments.
Given the stated aim - and rightly so - is to get every participant to their families and loved ones, the biggest immediate challenge for the BCCI is to get overseas players into their respective countries.
As it stands, most countries in the world have already banned entry for those coming in India or contemplating that.
Australia is one of the countries that have done the former.
New Zealand is still allowing citizens back in.
The UK will require those coming in to quarantine for 10 days at a government-approved hotel and test on days 2 and 8.
However, the UAE, a major transit point for most flights, has stopped entertaining flights from India.
Air travel from India to Bangladesh stands suspended but the land border is open with the caveat of a 14-day quarantine.
Mohammad Isam from Bangladesh: “BCB is in touch with the BCCI about the Bangladesh duo’s travel plans. It is not clear whether Shakib and Mustafizur will be doing a 3-day or a 14-day quarantine. It is being considered still because they are coming from India.”
The likes of Pat Cummins, Steven Smith, Glenn Maxwell, Ricky Ponting, Simon Katich and company are expected to join the commentator Michael Slater, who had already headed to the Maldives as a temporary post in the wake of blanket bans on entry to Australian citizens who have recently been in India, a state of play that will exist until at least May 15.
The BCCI stands to lose over Rs 2000 crore of the broadcast and sponsorship money earmarked for this year’s Indian Premier League (IPL) which was indefinitely postponed on Tuesday due to COVID-19 cases in its bio-bubble.“We would be losing anything between Rs 2000 to Rs 2500 crore for the midway postponement of this season,” a senior BCCI official told PTI.
After IPL postponement, T20 World Cup set for UAE shift
This year’s T20 World Cup is set to be moved from India to the UAE with the BCCI acknowledging that none of the participating teams would be “comfortable” coming here because “a third wave” of COVID-19 cases is expected at the time of the event.
“The suspension of IPL within four weeks is an indicator that it’s not really safe to host a global event of that magnitude at a time when the country is fighting its worst health crisis in last 70 years. There is a chance of a third wave hitting the Indian shores in November. So while BCCI will remain the hosts, the tournament will probably shift to the UAE,” a senior BCCI source told PTI.
NEWS : BCCI to conduct remaining matches of VIVO IPL in UAE.
The remaining 31 matches could be played between September-October.
IPL 2021 will be back, and soon. The BCCI in its SGM decided that the remainder of IPL will be held in the UAE in the September-October window, just before the T20 World Cup. In a statement on Saturday, BCCI general secretary Jay Shah said due to the monsoon season in India in the above-mentioned months, the board has made the decision to pick UAE as the venue.
ANNOUNCEMENT - IPL 2021 Season postponed
