IPL 2021: Sourav Ganguly hinted at ‘no crowd’ for the whole IPL 2021.
IPL 2021: The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) president Sourav Ganguly hinted that the whole forthcoming IPL might be played behind the closed gates with spectators. Ganguly said that the option to host the entire IPL without fans cannot be ruled out, stating entry of spectators could possibly pose the risk to the players.
BCCI secretary Jay Shah while unveiling the IPL 2021 Schedule on Sunday said that an unspecified part of the IPL 2021 will be played without fans.
It, however, looks contradictory for normal people to understand why BCCI is not allowing the fans to IPL games if they can allow them to the recent games of India vs England.
Explaining the move, Ganguly said, hosting a long 52 days tournament is different from having a bilateral series.
“Don’t know yet, depends on the situation,” Ganguly told India Today on Monday. “It’s [IPL] slightly different than a bilateral [series]. If you open up to crowds, there are teams playing in middle, there are teams practising outside as well. A lot of these stadiums have practice pitches outside, and teams practice there because they play every day. So to open it up to crowds, you expect them to get closer to the practising teams. So that could be a bit of a risk.”
Why IPL 2021 is being conducted without fans?
It will be the second time when IPL will be conducted without the fans. Ganguly said, last time also they kept the same policy. Started with the empty stadiums in Dubai and thought of opening it in the latter half however, the tournament went well so they didn’t opt to put anyone at risk.
“Dubai also was the same: we started closed doors and expected to open out to the crowds, but since it went so well, we didn’t take the risk of having crowds back, so we’ll see.”
A strong reason why the BCCI wants incident-free IPL is due to the fact that India will be hosting the ICC T20 World Cup 2021 later in the year. The ICC tournament will be played in the window of October and November. The venues are yet not finalised by the authorities.
Chief executive officer Manu Sawhney in a recent interview said that they will be closely monitoring the conduction of IPL and then only take a call.
The BCCI has made their minds to scrap the home and away games for this year and opted for six neutral venues. Mumbai, Chennai, Kolkata, Bangalore, Delhi and Ahmedabad will be hosting a 52-day long tournament and each team have to fly only thrice this time.
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