New Zealand Cricket Players Association chief executive Heath Mills has revealed that Kiwi players featuring in the ongoing Indian Premier League (IPL 2021) are “anxious” about the COVID-19 situation in India but none have plans to exit the T20 league yet.
While a number of Australian players including Adam Zampa and India’s R Ashwin pulled out of the ongoing IPL 2021, New Zealand cricketers have no such plans to quit the tournament midway and return home amid the surge in COVID-19 cases across the country.
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On Monday, April 26, Mills has confirmed that he has been in constant touch with a number of the New Zealand players competing in the world’s richest T20 tournament and claimed their cricketers well looked after by their franchises and they feel very safe in IPL bio-bubbles.
As reported by stuff.co.nz, Mills stated: “There’s no doubt they’re certainly anxious about what is happening in India and what they’re witnessing. But they feel well looked-after by their IPL franchises and very safe in their bubbles.”
Kane Williamson, Trent Boult, Kyle Jamieson, Mitchell Santner, Lockie Ferguson are among the leading New Zealand cricketers currently in India for IPL 2021 and Mills said none of them have yet expressed a desire to leave India due to the current situation and COVID-19 fear.
He added, “There’s four teams in a hotel and the hotel is locked down. The challenge is when they transfer from city to city, then they need to put on the PPE gear and that’s when they’re probably most at risk. Whilst they’re anxious, they’re ok. No one has indicated yet that they want to go home.”
New Zealand is scheduled to tour England for a Test series right after the conclusion of IPL 14 and then they will face India in the final of the ICC World Test Championship in Southampton in June.
Mills signed off by saying, “We’ve got players going to England for that test series; they can’t very well come home, do the two weeks isolation and then go to England, so they’re going to have to be there until the round-robin finishes, or the final series.
The players are in the safest place in India, in the team bubbles, which is the most important thing from my perspective.”
(stuff.co.nz inputs)
