Australia’s ace pacer, Pat Cummins is adhering to the expectations of the Indian Premier League (IPL) to get rolling soon. The bowler said he is in constant contact with his contracted franchise of IPL, Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) who are hopeful of the grandiose tournament to happen this year, as it still hasn’t been declared as canceled.
Cricket.co.au quoted Pat Cummins as saying on a videoconference on Friday, “Everything is changing, literally every single day. The last I spoke to (KKR team officials), they said they’re still really confident and hopeful it (the IPL) will be on at some stage.
“They obviously haven’t cancelled it or anything like that yet. It’s still a bit of a holding pattern, so we’re in contact with our teams every few days.”
The Board for Control of Cricket in India (BCCI) had declared the postponement of the league which was bound to commence on 29 March until April 15 in view of the outspread of the coronavirus infection and India declaring lockdown of the nation till 14th April. They are yet to fix a date for the tournament or decide whether it will get going this year. IPL officials, however, are considering the possibilities of the tournament to set in motion during the October-November window, if by any chance the T20 World Cup do not happen.
Although optimistic of the tournament to take place, the topliner cricketer does not expect any announcement of the league to get underway in the nearest future.
“Obviously everyone is still really keen for it to go ahead, but the priority is to minimise the risk of (the virus) spreading. It’s going to be pretty tight, I think the (Indian) travel ban is in place until April 14 so I don’t expect anything too soon to happen.”
Pat Cummins, signed by the KKR, is the most highly valued player in the IPL for the 13th edition of the IPL, being auctioned at Rs 15.5 crore.
