The growing number of COVID-19 cases in the country may not have affected the Indian Premier League that continues on despite lockdowns in several cities where the event is being played, and will be played over the next few weeks, but international boards have reportedly raised a concern about travelling to India later this year for the Men’s T20 World Cup.
The tournament is scheduled to take place between October and November this year but according to Sportstar ‘at least a couple of full members of the International Cricket Council have expressed reservations about travelling to India given the severity of the pandemic at the moment’.
A final decision though is expected to be made in June at the ICC’s annual conference by which time the cases are expected to subside.
Last week, the BCCI at the Apex Council meeting had decided on 9 venues across India to host the 16-team tournament with the final to take place at the Narendra Modi stadium in Gujarat. Mumbai, New Delhi, Chennai, Kolkata, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Dharamsala, Lucknow and Ahmedabad have been earmarked as the host cities but with most of them currently seeing the biggest rise in COVID cases, the ICC may ask the Indian board to cut down the list of venues.
An ICC events team was scheduled to visit India later in April to review the grounds and also the COVID situation in India but with the country currently in the middle of a sweeping second wave, that visit is expected to be postponed.
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