Kolkata Knight Riders spearhead Pat Cummins won’t be taking part in the remainder of the Premier League 2021 to be held in UAE, says a report in the Sydney Morning Herald.
While the team hasn’t given any particular reasons for his unavailability, indications are that it’s a case of looking to avoid excessive bio-bubble fatigue ahead of the T20 World Cup and the Ashes.
“David Warner and Pat Cummins could be rested from the West Indies tour because of family reasons – others could follow after a draining year in several bubbles – and Cummins, despite a multimillion-dollar IPL contract, has already said he will not return to the T20 tournament this season,”
the report said.
It’s a big blow for KKR, who picked Cummins last year for a whopping sum of INR 15.50 crores. Since his return to the setup, the Aussie has played all of their 21 fixtures since his return to the setup, taking 12 wickets at an economy rate of 7.86 last season and following that up with 9 scalps at 8.83 runs per over this year.
Cummins might not be the only Australian player unavailable for the rest of the IPL 2021, with Cricket Australia reportedly set to consider the mental health of its players in deciding whether they should be taking part in the UAE leg of the tournament.
“CA will need to decide whether it’s in the best mental health interests of its players to spend even more time in a bio-secure bubble.
CA could decide the IPL will ensure players are fine-tuned for the World Cup, which could also be held in the UAE.”
the report said.
With the Australian government suspending all flights from and to India due to the health crisis borne out of the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Aussies featuring in the IPL couldn’t directly travel back home. They went back via the Maldives, with one phase of isolation in the Island country and then another upon reaching Australia.
Australia are set to soon tour West Indies and Bangladesh for limited-overs assignments leading into the T20 World Cup and then build towards the home summer, where another Ashes awaits. Given the pandemic times, the bio-security regulations have only made it mentally tougher for the players to deal with the busy calendar.
The potential absence of multiple Aussies will be a body blow for the remainder of IPL 2021 since England have already decided they won’t be sending their players for the rescheduled T20 tournament.
Ashley Giles, England men’s Director of Cricket, had said that having already rotated and rested players to allow for their IPL 2021 participation earlier in the year, the three lions won’t anymore tweak their schedule for it. It means the strong likelihood of Jos Buttler, Ben Stokes, Jofra Archer, Eoin Morgan & co missing their respective IPL teams’ remaining matches.
The IPL 2021 was postponed indefinitely on May 4 after news of multiple COVID-19 positive cases inside different teams’ bubbles. While the tournament proceeded quite swiftly in Chennai and Mumbai, it didn’t prove so immune from the devastating second wave of the pandemic in Delhi and Ahmedabad.
Cummins’ KKR alone had two players – spinner Varun Chakravarthy and pacer Sandeep Warrier – testing positive before three non-playing members of the Chennai Super Kings’ contingent also proved affected by the contagious virus.
Additionally, Wriddhiman Saha of Sunrisers Hyderabad and Amit Mishra of Delhi Capitals also tested COVID-19 positive, which led BCCI to suspend the tournament ultimately.
