The 14th edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL) has been indefinitely postponed as the country battles the second wave of COVID-19. BCCI Secretary Jay Shah has come forward and clarified that they have always prioritized the safety of each and every person involved with the league. Speaking to ANI, Shah said that keeping an eye on the current COVID-19 situation, the BCCI and IPL Governing Council decided to postpone this edition.
Jay Shah had said, “The BCCI and the IPL GC have unanimously decided to postpone the 2021 season till further notice. We don’t wish to compromise the safety of the players, the people involved, the employees, the groundsmen, the match officials, every single person involved.”
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SunRisers Hyderabad wicket-keeper Wriddhiman Saha tested positive on Tuesday morning after there were a couple of more COVID-19 cases on Monday. While two of the members of the Chennai Super Kings (CSK) contingent tested positive, two Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) players tested positive — Varun Chakravarthy and Sandeep Warrier — leaving BCCI the BCCI to postpone the KKR-RCB game in Ahmedabad.
With Saha testing positive, the game on Tuesday evening between SRH and defending champions Mumbai Indians also needed to be postponed.
With all the circumstances that have been surrounding the tournament, the BCCI was finding it difficult to run the tournament until now, and with the pandemic situation, the suspension of the IPL was on the cards already. The BCCI might now have to wait for the situation to get under control and then plan for the tournament again.
Earlier, the BCCI had issued a release on the cases in KKR and said: “Varun Chakravarthy and Sandeep Warrier were found to be positive in the third round of testing in the last four days. All other team members have tested negative for COVID-19.”
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Apart from the infected players, already five players have pulled out of the IPL citing the Covid cases and commentator Michael Slater also withdrew from the tournament through the Maldives to return to his home nation. Kane Richardson, Adam Zampa, Liam Livingstone, Andrew Tye, and R Ashwin left the bio-bubble midway. There was huge concern over the other player’s availability as the nations started to ban people from India.
