Asia Cup called off due to Covid-19 situation

Watch: India Men’s, Women’s teams assemble in Mumbai for hard quarantine before England tour

The Board of Control in India informed that the members of both the men’s and women’s team of the country have reached Mumbai, their destination for the two weeks hard quarantine, before departure to England. Sharing the pictures of the flight where Men’s team member Ravichandran Ashwin and Women’s team captain Mithali Raj can be seen seating side by side, the official Twitter handle of BCCI captioned it as, “First stop, Mumbai #TeamIndia.” While the Indian Men’s team first assignment in England includes the World Test Championship Final at Southampton against New Zealand starting June 18, the team led by Mithali Raj would take on hosts England in one-off Tests at county Ground Bristol starting June 16. Both the teams will depart from India on June 2 and are expected to undergo a sofer quarantine regime on landing in England. The Women’s team is supposed to play a three meach each ODI and t20i series post the Test match while the Men’s team would have to wait almost 40 days before they get into international action against the hosts England. The Virat Kohli led side would play a five-match Test series against Joe Root’s team starting August 4.

Mohammed Shami opens up on leadership style of Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli

Mohammed Shami has a fair bit of international cricket and although his days for India at the international level has been more under Virat Kohli, the pacer has also been able to read the mind of Rohit Sharma—the leader. In an interview with India TV news, Shami has talked about different character among the senior member of the Indian team and highlighted the difference in approach of Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma. Shami has said that Rohit is a cool and calm advisor who shows faith in bowlers’ own mindset and backs them to execute according to their own tactics. “As a bowler, when I go to him for advice, he always gives positive answers. Rohit always pushes the bowlers to do what their mind tells them to, irrespective of how the batsman is playing or his strong points,” Mohammed Shami said on Wednesday. Rohit is a different character. He is a cool person, except when he comes to bat!” said Mohammed Shami On the other hand, he said that the skipper Virat Kohli is as aggressive as it gets and his aggressiveness can well be compared to that of pacers. Sportingly, Shami said that whenever big screens show Kohli’s animated celebration after fall of a wicket, he walks up to him and ask if he was the one who took the wicket or was it the bowler. Fast bowlers are very aggressive, both old and new. But the one player who could probably emulate their aggression is our own captain! Sometimes, when a picture of Virat’s celebration of a wicket goes viral on social media, I funnily ask him, “Was it my wicket or yours?” He celebrates more than the bowlers! Sometimes he points out that you don’t look too happy with the wicket, so I simply tell him, ‘You did all the celebration for me!’,” Shami added. Mohammed Shami has returned to the Test squad for the tour of England where India will first play New Zealand in the World Test Championship final and then will challenge England over a five-match series.

BCCI, ECB discuss 'tweaking' of 5-match England-India Test series to accommodate IPL 2021

BCCI marks England as most-preferred destination for IPL 2021, overlooks Sri Lanka, UAE as options

The Board of Control for Cricket in India is considering relocating the remaining portion of the 14th edition of IPL which was postponed indefinitely due to the rising number of Covid-19 cases to the United Kingdom, TOI reported. England has emerged as the most preferred location because the UK government is likely to allow spectators into the stadiums which the BCCI believe will boost the revenue for all itself and all stakeholders such as ECB, English counties and IPL franchises. “UK is a relatively costlier destination. But on the flipside, the UK government is allowing crowds for sports events. That means, franchises can earn from gate money and that will subsidize costs. As of now, this is how the BCCI is seeing it,” the TOI report said. The report also claimed that the BCCI has marked the UAE as only an alternative option to the UK in case the cost of holding the remained of the tournament will be estimated above the manageable level. The report also suggested that the BCCI has ruled out Sri Lanka as a potent location of choice for relocating the IPL 2021. “Only if costs are escalating to a point where it starts affecting stakeholders, the BCCI will consider the UAE as the second option for the IPL. On that front, we aren’t even discounting the idea of hosting the IPL in Sri Lanka,” the report said further. Notably, three English counties had offered to host the remainder of the IPL 2021 at their grounds in consultation with the ECB. The Surrey, the MCC and Warwickshire had written to the ECB to show interest in hosting the cash-rich league this year.