MUMBAI: “The IPL family doesn’t forget.” That was the reaction offered by retired cricketer turned commentator Aakash Chopra after English cricketers Dawid Malan, Chris Woakes and Jonny Bairstow announced they were skipping the remainder of IPL 2021 citing “personal reasons”.
If there ever was a case of warped priorities, this would very likely be up there with the best of them.
Blather from “concerned” Indian commentators aside, there is no getting away from the fact that the fifth and final Test in the Test series between hosts England and India was called off just two hours (emphasis ours) before it was supposed to start.
AND the decision by Team India’s cricketers had financial implications that need to be put out there.
But first a recounting of the justification of the cop out offered by BCCI president Sourav Ganguly. The former India captain, while speaking to Kolkata daily The Telegraph, has insisted his country’s players must NOT be blamed for the cancelled Test against England.
“They feared they must have contracted the disease and were dead scared. It’s not easy staying in a bubble. Of course, you have to respect their feelings.”
Fact: The Covid-19 crisis in the India camp erupted after head coach Ravi Shastri and other support staff contracted the virus and were isolated.
At least Ganguly did acknowledge the financial hit suffered by the English board from the whole fiasco. “They have incurred a lot of losses and it’s not going to be easy on the England and Wales Cricket Board,” Ganguly told The Telegraph.
Reports say India have offered to stage the match next year when they visit England for one-day and Twenty20 games.
That’s neither here nor there though. Everything is not about money, though in the BCCI’s book, that’s all it ever seems to be about. Speaking of books, what the Indian cricket board is directly culpable for is not taking ANY action over the root cause of what created the mess in the first place.
Which was all down to the launch event of Indian team head coach Ravi Shastri’s new book in London on September 1, following which he and other members of the team’s support staff tested positive for Covid-19. It was after this that Shastri and two fellow coaches developed symptoms and tested positive.
Concerns spread among the team because India captain Virat Kohli and other players had also attended the launch event.
The head coach’s act of indulging in a personal commercial activity by promoting his book in the midst of a pandemic, endangering the welfare of his team right in the middle of an important series by appearing maskless at a personal event held in public – in which the guests didn’t wear masks, too – is a serious breach of Covid guidelines issued by the BCCI itself.
And how did the BCCI president respond to the transgression by the coach? Said Ganguly: “How long can you stay confined to your hotel rooms? Can you stay locked at your home day in and day out?
“You can’t be restricted to a life where you go from the hotel to the ground and return to the hotel. This is humanly not possible.”
Ganguly also dismissed talk that the match had been cancelled to protect the Indian Premier League, which resumes in the United Arab Emirates on September 19. The BCCI “will never be an irresponsible board,” said Ganguly.
Really?
Well, here’s a recounting of events so that the chronology is well understood. At least as SportzPower sees it.
1. One man’s folly of organising a book release event in public WITHOUT even the bare minimum deterrence of wearing masks in the middle of a Test series lies at the root of the matter.
2. Since said man has the full backing of the Team India captain, there will not even be a proverbial rap on the knuckle by the “ever so responsible” Indian cricket board.
3. While ECB first announced that India had forfeited the Test (only natural seeing as the full blame for cancellation lay at the feet of the Indian side), they subsequently deleted that line from their announcement. Doesn’t take an Einstein to figure out why.
4. There is some irony here too if what a little bird has told SportzPower is indeed true. It appears that ECB chief executive Tom Harrison was among the “honoured guests” at Shastri’s book launch. One can only wonder whether in the spirit of the “junk masks” sentiment that was doing the rounds at the event, Harrison also followed suit.
5. Snarks aside, SportzPower understands that there is a £40 million hole in the books of the ECB and already financially strained Lancashire County due to Shastri’s folly.
6. And who cares about the fans in all this? The first three days of the 5th Test were fully sold out and only 2,000 tickets were still available for the fourth day, on the day of the Test was cancelled.
All of this is of course water under the bridge for the people who matter in the BCCI. So what does matter? That three British players refused to play ball with the sacrosanct IPL in a fit of pique or whatever. As Chopra so inelegantly put it: “The IPL family doesn’t forget.”
