Players to do their own laundry, clean toilets
KANPUR : With a view to ensuring safety amid the Covid pandemic, players of Indian and New Zealand cricket teams will do their own laundry and clean toilets during the first test of the two-match series to be played at the Green Park stadium here between November 25 and 29, said administrative officials and management officials of the hotel where the two teams would be staying in a bio-secure bubble.
For the first time the hotel staff would not be allowed to enter the rooms of the players on 14th and 17th floors, they added. “The two floors have been reserved for the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI). The entire staff working on these two floors will be quarantined a week before the match,” said a hotel official adding that the laundry would be stocked in the rooms for a week.
The used laundry would be kept in special bags as a part of the Covid protocol and it would be washed separately if the players asked for. Otherwise, they would do the needful, the hotel official said.
The Kiwi players, however, have made it clear it that they would not venture out of their rooms for food which would be placed outside their doors. In addition, the team management has made it clear that its players would clean their toilets and wash laundry, he said.
As for the food in the stadium, no buffet would be organised for the two teams like on the previous occasion. Instead, the teams would be given food packed in special Bento boxes imported from Japan for the match. Bento, or box lunches, are part of Japanese food culture.
Uttar Pradesh Cricket Association’s venue director Dr Sanjay Kapoor said the hotel was ready as per the standard operating procedures (SOPs) designed to keep the players in a bio bubble.