MUMBAI: The Board of Control for Cricket in India is yet to confirm dates for its South Africa tour in December this year.
Cricket SA (CSA) president Chris Nenzani said it was frustrating that dates for India’s summer tour have yet to be confirmed, the South African Sunday Times reported.
“It is an issue that we need to put finality to because the issue of scheduling and putting schedules together comes naturally. We’ve agreed on content and the issue is now how do we fit in that content. If you don’t have a centrally controlled Future Tours Programme, these issues are going to come up. But if the International Cricket Council promotes test cricket, you have to give everybody a fair chance and also their place in the sun,” he added.
The CSA has declared a net loss of 158.8 million Rand for the 2016/17 financial year, but hopes to recoup the losses with its upcoming home series with India and Australia.
The Sunday Times quotes CSA chief executive Haroon Lorgat as saying there will not be a Boxing Day test against India but the traditional New Year’s test will take place. “There will be a New Year’s test but it’s the starting date that is the issue. That’s what the board is discussing at the moment. We want to go back to India and try to appeal to them to respect the start date that we would like. Let us engage with them and let’s see how they respond, but this is something that we believe is important – to retain the test match starting date, especially in view of the current climate where we want to promote test cricket,” he said.
“We should have had finality a while back because we want to have the dates announced and want to get the promotion out of the way. It is the Freedom Trophy that we’re talking about and how many people actually know about the Mandela-Ghandi series. There’s lots that should have been done by now but this is the reality of the pressures of the calendar,” Lorgat added.
