India likely to pull out of Women’s tri series in England

Reports have emerged that the India Women’s Cricket team are not going to take part in the triangular series against England and South Africa scheduled to take place in England on September owing to the COVID-19 pandemic.

A source in the BCCI told the Times of India, “The COVID-19 situation in the country is getting worse and worse, hence we had no option but to abandon our plans to send the team to England for a Tri-series that was to feature India, England and the South African women teams. We’ve conveyed our inability to come to UK to the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) last week. In this situation, we can’t hold a camp even in England (as was decided earlier), as is there no clarity on when the regular commercial flights to London from India will resume,” a reliable source in the BCCI told TOI on Sunday.

“We had to cancel three tours (to Zimbabwe, Sri Lanka and then Sri Lanka for the Asia Cup) of the Indian men’s too recently. Everyone has suffered and we need to have patience in this period,” the source added.

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India were scheduled to tour England last month, but it was postponed to September due to the pandemic. Due to the fact that South Africa are supposed to tour England in September as well, the England and Wales Cricket Board decided to include a tri series in the fixtures with both South Africa and India in it. Now that the Indian Women’s Cricket team have all but cancelled their tour, the ECB would want to extend the bilateral series against South Africa, which comprises of 2 T20Is and 4 ODIs.

The ICC Women’s World Cup is scheduled to begin early on next year in New Zealand. The lack of match practice before the tournament might be a problem for India, given that they have now pulled out of the England tour.