NEW DELHI: BCCI president Sourav Ganguly has defended the attempt to hold the Indian Premier League (IPL) amid the worsening situation coronavirus situation, saying that it was not a mistake.
“It was not a mistake to hold IPL amid COVID-19. When we decided, the number was not even close to this. We did the England tour successfully,” India’s cricket chief said in an interview released today (Thursday).
Ganguly further said that the BCCI considered holding the IPL in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) but stuck with India because the cases were nothing. “It has just gone through the roof in the last three weeks. We discussed about the UAE but then decided to do it in India,” he added.
He added that “professional hands” had been managing the bio-bubble, but no sport could be pandemic-proof. “I really don’t know what led to this situation inside the biosecurity bubble. We will have to do a post-mortem and look into the reasons behind this,” Ganguly added.
Talking about a window for remaining matches, the BCCI president said, “We have to speak to other boards and see if a window can be made available before the T20 World Cup. Lot of things are involved and we will slowly start working on them.”
India suspended the world’s richest cricket tournament after several players tested positive for the novel coronavirus. India is reporting nearly 4,000 deaths and more than 400,000 new cases a day.
Nearly all the foreign stars have since left. Australian players, umpires and coaches were expected to arrive in the Maldives on Thursday to wait until they can return home without breaking a contentious ban on people who have been in India.
More than 10 players and back-up staff have tested positive since the eight teams started gathering for the tournament in bio-bubbles.
