The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has been forced to pull out the Indian women's team from a tri-series planned in England, also including South Africa, due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. 

Apart from the health risk, the fact that the women's team is yet to return to proper training and no international travel is allowed, were reasons enough for the BCCI to convey its inability to send the side to its English counterpart, the ECB, said a source within the board to the Times of India. 

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"The COVID-19 situation in the country is getting worse and worse, hence we had no option but to abandon our plans to send the team to England for a tri-series that was to feature India, England and the South African women teams," the BCCI source said.

"We’ve conveyed our inability to come to UK to the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) last week. In this situation, we can’t hold a camp even in England (as was decided earlier), as is there no clarity on when the regular commercial flights to London from India will resume."

"We had to cancel three tours (to Zimbabwe, Sri Lanka and then Sri Lanka for the Asia Cup) of the Indian men’s too recently. Everyone has suffered and we need to have patience in this period."

The development may now force the ECB to convert the tri-nation series into a bilateral one against South Africa. England women's team has been practising for the last four weeks in anticipation of cricket's return after a lengthy hiatus. 

The source informed TOI that there was another major hurdle in the way of the Indian tour. 

"What made things worse was that the BCCI is yet to appoint a national women’s selection committee since January. On January 18, the BCCI had invited applications for the five vacant posts, but the process wasn’t taken further. After that, everything stopped because of the lockdown."

The women's selection panel, headed by Hemlata Kala, has seen all its five members complete their tenures, with the last selection taking place in January for the T20 World Cup in Australia.