The much awaited T20 tournament IPL is lined up under 2 months from 19th September. The tournament was earlier scheduled in India from 29th March. The novel coronavirus had pushed the tournament indefinitely and given it a new direction. The tournament will be played in UAE with an extra health security called “the bio-secure bubble”.
A BCCI report on Tuesday said that all Indian players and support staff will have to undergo 2 tests of COVID-19 RT-PCR back to back in a gap of 24 hours. After testing negative, they will join the respective team squad where all players will undergo a quarantine period of 2 weeks.
“Following their arrival in the UAE, the players and support staff will have to return at least three negative tests during a week’s quarantine and if they are negative, they can enter the bio-bubble and start training. There could be minor changes to this protocol depending on the feedback from the teams but there will not be any compromise on players and team officials’ safety,”- BCCI official said
Speaking on overseas players the Official said- “All overseas players and support staff also need to undergo two COVID-19 RT-PCR tests before flying to the UAE and can only fly if the tests are negative. If not, then the same 14-day quarantine period and two negative tests to be able to fly to the UAE,”
During 14-day quarantine in UAE the players will be tested on day 1,3 6. After clearing all these tests they will finally get to play the tournament. During the tournament they will be tested every 5th day which sums up to approx 10 tests.
BCCI has left it with franchises to decide whether to allow families along with players or not. The families (if allowed) must be within the bio-secure environment and meeting any other person outside the environment is strictly prohibited. BCCI official added- “The families will also not be allowed to enter the PMOA (players and match officials area) and field of play at any time during the training and matches. And anyone who breaches the bio-secure protocols will have to be in self-isolation for seven days and return two negative tests on day 6 and 7 to be allowed to re-enter the bio-bubble”.