KOLKATA: The ongoing friction between Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) and star player Shakib Al Hasan will keep Kolkata Knight Riders sweating over the latter’s availability for the upcoming IPL. A day after the all-rounder said that the board has misinterpreted his intentions for picking IPL over the country’s Test series in Sri Lanka, BCB in an impromptu meeting at its president Nazmul Hassan’s residence on Sunday evening, decided to reconsider the No Objection Certificate (NOC) issued to Shakib for IPL.
BCB cricket operation chairman Akram Khan said as Bangladesh will travel to Sri Lanka for the Tests, it was implied that Shakib preferred IPL.
“But now that he wants to play Tests, from what he has said, we will discuss his NOC in the next couple of days. If he is interested, he will play the Tests in Sri Lanka,” Akram was quoted as saying in Bangladesh media.
In such a scenario, Shakib will miss the IPL between April 21 and May 3 when the two-match Test series, which is part of ICC World Test Championship, is scheduled. It was also learnt that the BCB officials have taken exception to Shakib’s words and are even considering slapping a fine or a ban on him.
The Bangladesh all-rounder, who was picked by KKR for Rs 3.2 crore in the auctions last month, had already missed the 2020 edition as he was suspended.
Knights set up base in Mumbai:
With no home matches this time, KKR will not make Eden Gardens their base. Instead the Knights will prepare for the tournament in Mumbai and the first set of players, including former skipper Dinesh Karthik, Varun Chakravarthy, Rahul Tripathi, Kamlesh Nagarkoti, Sandeep Warrier, Vaibhav Arora, along with assistant coach Abhishek Nayar and assistant bowling coach Omkar Salvi, have already checked into the team hotel there.
KKR’s two big foreigner players Sunil Narine and Andre Russell have also started their journey from the West Indies and will join the others soon.
As per BCCI’s guidelines, all players, support staff and management need to undergo a seven-day quarantine in their hotel rooms. There will be in-room testing done on Days two, five and seven and only if all three results are negative can the individual enter the bio-bubble.
However, the board has stated that no player will be vaccinated during the tournament. Anyone testing positive will need to isolate for a minimum of 10 days and clear the testing process before reintegrating into the bio-secure environment, which will be monitored by ‘bubble integrity managers’.
However, players who are part of the India-England ODI series will be allowed bubble-to-bubble transfer without having to serve a quarantine. KKR skipper Eoin Morgan, Shubman Gill, Kuldeep Yadav and Prasidh Krishna will thus join the squad straightaway after the ODI series.