BCCI reluctant about 5 Test match series against Australia

Talks of extending the span of the Test Series between Australia and India later this year from 4 Test matches to 5 were surfacing from the Australian Cricket Board along with successfully hosting the T20 World Cup within October itself, despite the Australian government sealing the international boundaries till September 30 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

However, it turns out that the BCCI is reluctant to commit to the same proposal at this point of time. In an interview to IANS, a BCCI official said that at the moment, due to the pandemic at its most critical stage, it is too early to make these kind of decisions, as no one knows what the situation will be in another 7-8 months.

“It is too early to say if we will be keen to play five Tests in Australia at the end of the year. The current situation is a great teacher and we need to play it one ball at a time. Right now, the situation isn’t right to even think about something that is seven or eight months away. Who knows what the situation will be in October? Let us first see how things unfold and only then we can talk about these things. You don’t really know if the travel directives will undergo further changes in the near future,” the official said.

ALSO READ: Travel exemptions for India team’s tour Down Under?

Apparently, the Australian government may exempt the travelling Indian team in order to save the cricket board from losing a whopping 300 million dollars in the wake of the pandemic.
A report from ESPNcricinfo reads that, ‘International exemptions to allow an India touring party to arrive in Australia next summer would be seriously considered by the federal government in the event of wider travel bans, strongly suggesting that Cricket Australia will be able to avoid losing up to AUD 300 million in revenue in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic.’

CA is also said to have received a positive response from its government regarding the same. “The governing body is understood to have received highly encouraging news about their outlook, at least as far as the lucrative India tour is concerned,” the report stated.