India’s batting legend, Sunil Gavaskar said the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2020 can be held in September-October if the T20 World Cup is postponed by the International Cricket Council (ICC). During a chat with India Today, he said even BCCI is securing window for IPL 2020, but Monson will not allow the board to host the tournament in September and October.
Gavaskar said the BCCI can think about hosting IPL 2020 overseas in either Sri Lanka or the UAE, given the two cricket boards have offered to host the cash-rich T20 league. He explained, “If the IPL is held in Sri Lanka from September then it might be possible. So instead of the 14 matches per team, the tournament will be reduced to maybe 7 matches per team. That might be possible and only then maybe the IPL can happen. Maybe, Sri Lanka or UAE can host the IPL.”
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IPL governing council chairman Brijesh Patel told this website that the BCCI is looking at the September-October window for hosting the IPL. Meanwhile, Sunil Gavaskar said the T20 World Cup can also go ahead as scheduled if the Australian government is confident of hosting the 16-team tournament.
Talking about the same, Gavaskar said, “After hearing what the Australian govt said, it seems like the T20 World Cup can happen. If the T20 World Cup got canceled then only the IPL window as possible. The T20 World Cup can happen but there will be 16 teams in the tournament with 15 players each including their support staff, doctors, etc. It will be difficult to hold but if the Australian government says it can happen, then it can happen maybe in October-November.”
Recently, the ICC banned the use of saliva to shine the ball which could be a major setback for pacers who like to retain the shine on the ball. Talking about the same, Sunil Gavaskar said fans will have to get used to cricket without the team huddles and players will have to adapt to playing in front of empty stands.
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The batting legend elaborated, “Team huddles, celebrating wickets… maybe we won’t get to see that for a few months. That was part of the joy but we won’t see that for a while. Even the glove-glove between batsmen will be missing but we have to get used to these changes because cricket will be sanitized for a while.”
Sunil Gavaskar said players will be scared of even touching the ball on the ground which passes between all 11 fielders but said it was important for everyone to trust each other.
