The much-awaited Indian Premier League (IPL) was scheduled to start from 29 March this year. However, the outbreak of the dreaded coronavirus pushed the start of the cash-rich league from 29 March to 15 April and given that the number of COVID-19 cases in India continue to rise, it is likely that the tournament is further postponed or called off.
Despite all sorts of speculations, there has been no official word from the BCCI as of now. In a recent media interaction though, BCCI boss Sourav Ganguly talked about the plans regarding the tournament and the possibility of it going ahead amid the unprecedented circumstances.
“We keep monitoring developments. At the present moment, we can’t say anything. And what is there to say anyway? Airports are shut, people are stuck at home, offices are locked down, nobody can go anywhere. And it seems this is how it’s going to be till the middle of May,” Ganguly told New Indian Express.
Where will you get players from, where do players travel. It’s just simple common sense that at the moment, nothing is in favour of any kind of sport anywhere in the world, forget IPL”, he added.
There were various media reports which claimed that the organisers might be looking at different windows in the calendar year to organise in the league. A BCCI official had even gone to claim that the tournament might be organised within a small duration if its possible to start the tournament in early May.
When Ganguly was asked about the announcement of the status of the tournament, he replied, “I will be able to give an update on that on Monday (13 April) after speaking to the other office-bearers (of BCCI). But practically speaking, when life has come to a standstill everywhere in the world, where does sport have a future in this”.