IPL 2021 likely to resume in September-October in UAE

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New Delhi: The BCCI will lock in a three-week window between September 15 and October 15 for the resumption of the currently-suspended IPL in the UAE, when it holds a Special General Meeting (SGM) virtually on Saturday.

The agenda of the meeting is “discussing on the upcoming cricket season in the view of pandemic prevailing in India”.

The wider scope of the agenda permits the members to also discuss the ICC T20 World Cup and the much-delayed compensation package for domestic cricketers for the cancelled last Ranji Trophy season.

BCCI also wants to host the T20 World Cup in India and during the June 1 ICC Board meet, it would ask the global body to wait on the Covid-19 situation here before any call is taken.

BCCI president Sourav Ganguly is expected to chair Saturday’s meeting from Mumbai. The IPL is expected to restart between September 18 and 20 and end on October 10 with three venues in the UAE, Abu Dhabi, Dubai and Sharjah hosting the matches.

“Obviously, the main issue would be the IPL schedule. We are expecting 10 double-headers and seven single headers apart from four play-off games (2 qualifiers, one eliminator) including the final. The resumption game and final will be held on weekends,” a senior BCCI official told PTI on the eve of the meeting.

It is expected that a lot of deliberations will also happen on how to procure the services of the overseas players and other logistical aspects including bubble-to bubble transfer.

“England Cricket Board director of cricket Ashley Giles has already said that England players won’t be allowed to play IPL as they would follow the international commitments ahead of ICC T20 World Cup.

“Hopefully, the president and secretary would tell us how the situation of English players will be handled,” a franchise official, who would be tracking the developments, told PTI.

The likes of Jos Buttler, Ben Stokes (if fit), Jofra Archer (if fit), Jonny Bairstow, Sam Curran, Eoin Morgan, Moeen Ali are all first team players for their franchises and getting their replacements won’t be easy.

The Indian team’s commitments in England end on September 14 with the last day of the final Test in Manchester and it would directly fly to Dubai aboard a charter flight after the series ends.

Only Hanuma Vihari and Abhimanyu Easwaran are expected to go home as they don’t have IPL contracts for the time being.