SA vs SL : Cricket South Africa withdraw Beuran Hendricks and Keegan Petersen from Test squad

Cricket South Africa (CSA) have withdrawn Beuran Hendricks and Keegan Petersen from the squad to play Sri Lanka. Although CSA cannot reveal the two names who have tested positive for Covid-19, one can only assume that they have been infected in the latest identification.

With the Dolphins vs Titans marring by a cluster of Covid-19 cases, where multiple national players were part of it, there were genuine doubt how South Africa would sail through this. It turned out that they did as 17 squad members test negative for the virus on all three occasions.

Also Read: Rohit Sharma’s Participation Unlikely To Be Affected By Sydney Covid Cluster 

CSA, however, have let go of Beuran Hendricks and Keegan Petersen but didn’t officially tell that if they are, in fact, the ones who have tested positive for the virus. But it has also been announced that they will not add any players to the squad for the two-Test series which starts on Boxing Day.

South Africa can train with full squad

Given three rounds of testing are already over, South Africa can begin training as a full squad on Wednesday and can go out of their hotel rooms at the Irene Country Club. Sri Lanka are also housed in the same hotel but both squads can’t meet each other till Friday.

The Sri Lankan team will only be allowed to travel to SuperSport Park and the Wanderers, the two venues for the series, and will be confined to their hotel room otherwise.

To host Australia without any glitch, South Africa need to prove that they are fully secure and a glitch, as it did in the England series, might result in cancellation. That will be too costly for South Africa to handle given their crunch financial situation.