T20 World Cup 'unrealistic or very difficult': Chairman of host Australia's cricket board

Cricket Australia's chairman Earl Eddings termed the possibility of the T20 World Cup to go ahead as planned later this year as unrealistic as countries were still in the midst of the battle with the coronavirus pandemic. The showpiece tournament, which is scheduled to be hosted by Australia in October-November, has not been officially called off with the ICC deciding to defer its decision on the tournament to a further date in July in their last meeting on June 10. However, Cricket Australia chairman's comments might serve as an indication of what is expected to come in the future. 

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'Unrealistic'

Speaking to reporters, Earl Eddings said that while the ICC hadn't formally called-off the T20 World Cup yet, the chances of the tournament being played in the scheduled window is highly unlikely with countries battling COVID and amid rising number of cases. Eddings opined that it would be tough to get the 16 countries into Australia for the tournament amid the pandemic and restrictions enforced by COVID. However, he said that ICC were holding meetings to discuss other alternatives. 

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'This is going to be looked at': Scott Morrison

"This is going to be looked at over the next few weeks. For the larger ones (venues) I would venture that it would be the subject of a discrete approval for each venue that would be worked out with the Chief Health Officer in each state or territory," Morrison was quoted as saying by 'ESPNCricinfo'."So by the time you get into July, there may be that type of opportunity for the rules that apply to those under 40,000 carry over to those above 40,000. These will be practical, commonsense issues, work through by the medical expert panel over the next few weeks and I think they will give a great instruction."

"When you're up above 40,000, you've got more than 10,000 people going to a gathering, that has implications for the egress and access of and to those premises, public transport crushes, all those sorts of things," he explained."That will require much more significant work," Morrison added.

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