Former New Zealand cricketer, as well as Mumbai Indians fielding coach James Pamment, has shared that Australia and New Zealand players got more fearful after the deadly COVID-19 virus hit the Kolkata Knight Rider and Chennai Super Kings’ camps. However, Pamment, along with Trent Boult, Finn Allen, Jimmy Neesham, Adam Milne, Scott Kuggeleijn, Shane Bond and Mike Hesson has reached their country Saturday night after IPL 2021 was suspended midway with an immediate effect due to the rising cases of COVID-19 in India.

Pamment, who was staying in India since January said that he felt safe in the bio-bubble that made for the players and he was in the Mumbai Indians camp. However, it was only the inter-city travel that raised concerns amid the situation as well.

“We’d pretty much taken over a hotel in Mumbai and created a safe space – I think I was the first person in there. You felt as long as everyone was disciplined and people weren’t tempted … staff were also part of the bubble, they had to isolate for a two-week period before working and we were getting regular tests, so you felt it was an extremely safe bubble being formed. You did feel confident you’d be fine, and everybody around you would be fine,” Pamment said to Stuff.co.nz.

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“We felt the travel was always going to be a challenge. We had a case ourselves on our first travel when we went to Chennai to prepare for the start of the tournament – it was a support staff member, fortunately, picked up very quickly and he was isolated, and none of the people considered close contacts to him were infected. But it was a very early reminder that your bubble’s not impenetrable. We probably got even stricter around how we operated,” he further added.

James Pamment again shared that he was happy with the management and how they manage the whole situation. However, he again expressed that they felt very confident and secure in the franchise’s management. And, they never felt any risk in the bio-bubble despite the situation in the country was getting worse as well.

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“We all had MIQ vouchers booked for June, so as soon as we knew we were coming back, we jumped online individually to get the vouchers. The plane was initially booked for three people – myself, Shane Bond and Adam Milne – because Trent’s plans were to go to England, Jimmy Neesham’s plans were to go to England. RCB [Royal Challengers Bangalore] hadn’t had any cases and the Mumbai management were happy to consider them coming back with us as well,” he concluded.