India’s IPL stars off to UAE, to undergo 6-day quarantine
The India cricketers, who are contracted to play the Indian Premier League Phase 2, took chartered and commercial flights to the United Arab Emirates on Saturday after returning negative RT-PCR tests for the second time in two days.
The travel arrangements were made by the players’ respective franchises. The players had to make early departures for the remainder of IPL 2021, starting September 19, after India’s fifth Test against England in Manchester was postponed indefinitely following a COVID-19 outbreak in the tourist’s camp.
“The good news is that all the players and support staff members have tested negative for the second time. The reports arrived late on Friday evening and most of them are already on their way to Dubai for the IPL,” a senior BCCI official said on Saturday.
“Two non-IPL players, Abhimanyu Easwaran and Arjan Nagwaswalla, will be flying out on Monday with the rest of the support staff. They will be flying to their respective Indian cities via Dubai and will take a commercial flight,” added the senior official.
The players departed in clusters – some took chartered flights arranged by franchises like Mumbai Indians and Sunrisers Hyderabad while players of Chennai Super Kings took a commercial flight.
“Mumbai Indians flew in three of its Indian contingent members – captain Rohit Sharma, Jasprit Bumrah and Suryakumar Yadav – to Abu Dhabi on a private chartered flight. The trio, along with their families, arrived on Saturday morning and will now undergo six days of hard quarantine,” MI issued a statement.
“All members had returned negative RT-PCR results before departure. A new RT-PCR test was undertaken upon arrival at Abu Dhabi, which are negative as well,” it also stated. Royal Challengers Bangalore captain Virat Kohli and pacer Mohammed
Siraj also took a chartered flight from Manchester.
“Keeping the safety and security of our players as the utmost priority, Royal Challengers Bangalore has arranged a special chartered flight for captain Virat Kohli and Mohammed Siraj to ensure their safe transit to the UAE. Both Virat and Siraj will undergo a six-day quarantine in Dubai before joining the team bio-secure bubble,” RCB said in a release.