Safety remains paramount as the BCCI is gearing up to host the 14th edition of Indian Premier League (IPL) at home from April 9 to May 30.
According to a Cricbuzz report, the Indian board, in its Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) and bio-secure protocols, has mentioned that the players can directly enter a franchise bubble from their national-team bubbles.
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It means that the India and England players can directly enter their IPL bubbles without having to serve another stern quarantine.
In other cases, however, everyone related to the tournament must undergo seven days of isolation.
"Players coming directly from the Bubble created for the India vs. England series, may be permitted to join the franchise squad without serving the mandatory quarantine period, provided they satisfy the criteria of moving directly to the franchise team hotel either in the team bus or on a chartered flight (sic)," the BCCI stated in a note which has been accessed by Cricbuzz.
"If chartered flights are used then all protocols for crew members must be followed. If the travel arrangements are to the satisfaction of the BCCI Chief Medical Officer then such players will directly enter the franchise team Bubble without the need to serve a quarantine period or undergo an RT-PCR test," the note added.
The report further says that 12 bubbles will be created in total, with eight of them for the franchise teams and support staff, two for the match officials and the remaining couple for the broadcast commentators and crew.
As per the report, BCCI’s officials and operations teams will not be part of any bubble and as a result, they won’t be allowed to personally interact with any player, team support staff, match management teams and broadcast crews.
In order to ensure the smooth conduct of the tournament, the BCCI will also appoint four security staff with each franchise team. They will be part of the respective franchise bubbles and travel with the teams throughout the T20 league.
"Their job will be to report any Bio-secure Environment protocol breaches by members of the franchise team to the BCCI Chief Medical Officer," the note said.
As far as the vaccination is concerned – the BCCI has made it clear that it is not possible to give jab to those involved in the league.
"The vaccination program against COVID-19 is underway in India and vaccines are currently being administered to the at-risk population viz. front-line workers, health care professionals, people over the age of 60 years and those between the ages of 45-59 years who have comorbidities like cardiac ailments, diabetes, cancer, etc. Until most of the population is vaccinated and immune to the SARS-CoV-2 virus, precautions will need to be taken to contain the spread of COVID-19 in the community," the note said.
(Inputs from Cricbuzz)
