Ahead of the first ODI of the recently played series between India and England, India captain Virat Kohli had put forward his suggestion regarding the need to keep players in the loop when it comes to scheduling games as life in the bio-bubble can get a little difficult both physically and mentally. But the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has a belief that re-working on the International time table could hectic in the current scenario, with keeping the stakeholders in mind.
Talking to the media, a BCCI spokesperson confronted about the topic and said that Kohli may have a valid concern but it could raise other concerns as to making changes now would be difficult in the current scene of COVID-19.
“It may be a valid concern but the alternate would raise much bigger concerns. It can be addressed in two ways, the first is o figure out a rotation policy that gives players some freedom for downtime. Take the example of the ECB where Joe Root is only playing red-ball cricket when a player of his caliber would do extremely well in white-ball cricket. The second is to schedule a lesser number of international games. The execution of any of these paths is not that simple,” he said.
When asked about the problems that would be faced, the spokesperson pointed out a lot of possibilities including the effect on the financial budget of the domestic cricketers, about which the BCCI is trying to look into it since the COA era. BCCI believes that a good and strategic structure is in which the domestic players have enough motivation to pursue the game as a career option.
“Firstly, contrary to assumptions, the BCCI’s wealth is not infinite. Secondly, the stock of the domestic cricketers deserves a greater amount of attention, especially when the outcome of the review of players payments that was undertaken about every three years back was quite ad-hoc and was skewed heavily in the favor of a few while bypassing those who were made the poster boys of the review. Thirdly, there is an increase in the number of state association who have a steep task facing them to develop the game in their regions which they had not done earlier and this is in addition to the existing associations who have been struggling to meet their own standards with their shakeup that has taken away experience across the board,” he further explained.
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“Kohli has raised a very important point while talking about the importance of scheduling, going forward and he does have the luxury to raise this point.. But he has not expressed any reservations regarding the scheduling of IPL, so one presumes that he is okay with that and the possible increase in the number of games once the new teams are added later this year,” BCCI official stated.
