Rising COVID cases: Yesterday, it was reported that two teams returned confirmed COVID-19 positive cases among players and staff. Two players and three staff members from two teams returned COVID-19 positive cases forcing yesterday’s match to be postponed. Chennai Super Kings went into a week-long quarantine to contain the situation.
Today, two players from the Sunrisers Hyderabad have also returned positive tests. This makes it the third franchise to return positive tests.
The Decision: After a lot of back and forth in the morning about how the situation can be mitigated, the IPL has released a statement to suspend the season indefinitely with respect to the COVID-19 situation.
IPL Chairman Brijesh Patel said the decision was taken keeping in mind safety of all stakeholders.
Comparison to PSL: In March, the PSL ended in a similar fashion after the bio secure bubble was breached. The implosion of cases during a peak pandemic affecting a sports league happened for the second time this cricket season. Questions will also be raised if conducting the PSL in June will be safe or not.
India’s situation: A week long debate was going on to assess if the IPL is morally okay to conduct in current circumstances or not. However, the surge of cases among players proves how dire the circumstances are. Even top of the line bio-secure bubble arrangements could not keep players safe.