IPL 2021: “The world stops a little bit” says Tim Seifert on recovering from COVID-19
New Zealand and Kolkata Knight Riders wicketkeeper batsman Tim Seifert broke down while sharing his experience with COVID-19.
In conversation with New Zealand Herald, New Zealand, and Kolkata Knight Riders, wicketkeeper-batsman Tim Seifert broke down while sharing his experience with COVID-19.
He was tested positive for COVID-19 during the recently suspended IPL 2021. Seifert failed in two pre-departure tests when he was supposed to fly to New Zealand after IPL suspension in charter flights earlier this month. He was isolated in Ahmedabad. Later he was shifted to Chennai for treatment. Now he is in 14-day quarantine, serving his isolation period at a hotel in Auckland, New Zealand.
“I got pulled aside and told I’d tested positive and my heart sank straight away when everyone left,” he said. “I was the only overseas player still left in India out of the whole tournament. That’s when things got a little bit real,” an emotional Seifert told.
“The world stops a little bit, I just couldn’t think what was next and that’s the scary part of it – you hear about things, and I thought that was going to happen to me,” he added.
Seifert talked highly of IPL’s bio-bubble
“Talking to some of the English boys that were over there before the IPL … everything that they were saying was doing well. You only kind of heard good things, the structures, all the plans that have been put in place,” Seifert said
“That was a good point of view for a player to go over there, and to be honest the whole time while I was over there (in India), the bubble felt good… felt safe.”
KKR coach Brendon McCullum and CSK coach Stephen Fleming helped me get through it informed Seifert.
“It was hard and I couldn’t thank Brendon (McCullum) and (Stephen) Fleming enough, they made everything a lot easier,” Seifert said.
“Making sure things would be put in place and KKR, CSK support staff, management – they made life easy for me to know that everything would be alright and when that time was to come home, they would do everything to get me home safely and on time,” he said.
Seifert revealed that there are reasons for him to be excited.
“Once a few days had gone by, everything had kind of died down a little bit …I knew it was a time of getting through it, looking at the positives. I’m getting married in two months so that’s exciting. My fiancee Morgs – she’s quite happy that I’m back a bit earlier so I can help plan for that,” Seifert said.
“I’m lucky that having COVID-19 has very minimal-mild symptoms. From having the virus and how I’m feeling…It’s more about the process of quarantining, being stuck in a room knowing that if I get it I could get it worse, other people could get it worse”
Tim Seifert was the third player from Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) to test positive for COVID-19 after Varun Chakravarthy, Sandeep Warrier. Later, on May 8th Prasidh Krishna also tested positive.
Tim Seifert is yet to make his IPL debut from KKR and has played three One Day International’s and 35 T20I’s for New Zealand.