An ICC recce team was supposed to reach Delhi on April 26 to look at how the IPL biobubble was functioning.
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The BCCI is confident about India hosting the T20 World Cup despite a rise in the number of COVID-19 cases. However, it is reported that the ICC event could be held in five cities instead of nine venues that were shortlisted originally. As per norms, ICC keeps a back-up country in case of unprecedented situations. For over a year, it has been UAE.
“We are still hopeful that with five months left and a significant population being vaccinated, we will be in a position to host World T20. Yes, one of the options could be curtailing the nine venues to a maximum four or five,” a senior BCCI office-bearer told PTI.
An ICC recce team was supposed to reach Delhi on April 26 to look at how the IPL bio-bubble was functioning. However, due to many travel restrictions imposed on India, the plan was postponed.
“Yes, the team was supposed to arrive earlier this week. But with travel bans in place, they will come later once the situation returns to normalcy,” the office bearer said. BCCI’s GM (Game Development) Dhiraj Malhotra was quoted by the BBC saying ‘UAE is the back up venue’.
“You always have a back up venue and UAE has been the venue. There’s nothing new in what Dhiraj had said,” the office bearer said.
Usually, when ICC World T20 is hosted by Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, the event takes place in three or four venues. But it hasn’t been a case in India due to board politics and related compulsions.
A former BCCI office bearer, who was involved in organisation of both 2011 World Cup and 2016 World T20 said “You have Sourav Ganguly’s city (Kolkata), vice-president Rajiv Shukla’s city (Lucknow), secretary Jay Shah’s city (Ahmedabad), treasurer Arun Dhumal’s city (Dharamsala). There are four best stadiums in Mumbai, Chennai, Delhi and Bangalore along with Hyderabad,” he said, hinting that these big venues cannot be ignored.
“The BCCI has shown that two distinct bubbles at one given point in time work wonderfully well. At the moment, it’s scattered to nine cities. It would be a nightmare with 16 teams in question,” the source said.
“For Pakistan, it’s always safe to play in Delhi or Lucknow since Mumbai is out of question. Similarly, for England or Australia, Mumbai is logistically very convenient. So these are certain factors,” he said.
