The Indian team will travel to Australia for a full tour comprising of 4 Tests, 3 ODIs, and 3 T20Is starting in December 2020. The players participating in the IPL 2020 will fly directly to Australia from the UAE, while the Test specialists will reach Australia early to get acclimatized.
Now it has come to the knowledge that the Indian team will end up having to train in "small groups" during their quarantine period whenever they land in Adelaide during the Australian tour later this year.
The likelihood of Virat Kohli and the Indian team starting their Test campaign in the South Australian capital has gained ground over the last few days after the Western Australian state government declared that neither the Australian nor Indian cricketers will be shown any leniency in terms of quarantine regulations.
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While the visitors will be allowed to go through their routines immediately upon arriving in Adelaide, they'll have to divide themselves into groups of 3 to 4 players to do so.
SA deputy chief public health Officer Michael Cusack said to ABC website, "They will be allowed to train in what you might consider smaller bubbles. So, there might be three or four players that would be allowed to train during their quarantine period, and it would be the same consistent players.”
India is scheduled to name their Test squad in October and based on recent reports the selection committee is expected to pick a 23-25 member squad.
The medical officer emphasized on the same three or four players will have to continue training with each other over their quarantine phase. So, we might see perhaps the fast bowlers and the top-order batsmen form their own exclusive bubbles for training purposes.
"If you had the whole party training together and one person inadvertently tested positive all of them would become a close contact (and) everyone would need a further 14 days of isolation and quarantine," the officer added.
The SA government's announcement is opposite to what BCCI president Sourav Ganguly had said two months back about wanting softer quarantine restrictions for Indian players. It is instead in keeping with how different states around Australia have reacted and are continuing to react to the COVID-19 crisis.
In contrast to Western Australia, who have literally shut off the rest of the country with very strict border restrictions, SA has been a bit more welcoming. And it's for this reason that India is very likely to play their first out of four Tests at the Adelaide Oval, where they won two years ago.
And if Melbourne, which showed a minor spike in COVID-19 cases on Wednesday (September 9), fails to be deemed safe enough, the Boxing Day Test might also be played in Adelaide as well.
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Brisbane is also the only current competitor for Adelaide with regards to who gets to welcome Kohli's Indian team in November. Most expect the Gabba to be awarded the white-ball leg of the tour, with the visitors set to play 3 T20Is and 3 ODIs.
The brand-new Adelaide Oval Hotel which is in its final stages of construction and is set to officially open on September 25, will host the Indian team during their quarantine period. That'll give them access not only to the Oval itself but also Adelaide Oval 2 next door.
Indian team might also get to play a warm-up game under lights with a pink ball in Adelaide as preparation for their first-ever overseas day-night Test. But that will hinge on the complete make-up of the schedule, which is expected to be released by Cricket Australia this week.
(Cricbuzz.com inputs)
