The breakout of COVID-19 around the world has taken a toll on global affairs and placed a stop order on sports.
The impact of the disease has forced Cricket West Indies (CWI) and Cricket South Africa (CSA) to postpone both the Women’s Colonial Medical Insurance One Day International (ODI) series and the Men’s ‘A’ Team Series.
The Men’s game was set to take place in Antigua in June while the women series was scheduled to begin at the end of the month in Jamaica and Trinidad.
The five-match Women’s series before the ICC Women’s Cricket World Cup Qualifier in July would have given the women from the Caribbean needed match practice and perhaps heal the wounds from the shellacking taken in their most recent outings.
South Africa’s automatic qualification and the postponement of the Women’s Qualifier Tournament due to the COVID-19 pandemic, made it easy for CWI and CSA to agree to put off the tour.
Additionally, both teams agreed to call it quits on the ‘A’ Team tour given the uncertainty of international travel, quarantine requirements, and players’ health and safety.
“The health and safety of the players and coaching staff is of paramount importance to both CWI and CSA, and with the current COVID-19 travel restrictions, it is impossible for us to consider both tours taking place as we had originally planned,” stated CWI CEO Johnny Grave.
He further said, “We are continuing our discussions with CSA on the feasibility of hosting the Men’s tour later this summer and will have further discussions in due course on new dates for the Women’s and ‘A’ Team tours.”
Meanwhile, CSA’s acting CEO Jacques Faul said the situation is disappointing.
“It is a frustrating state of affairs in which cricket finds itself around the world, but there are more important issues that have to be confronted, and the wellbeing of our players and support staff must always come first,” said Faul.
“Both our men’s and women’s national teams are keen to get back on the playing field as soon as possible.
“They want to build on their recent good results with the men achieving a 3-0 victory over Australia in their recent Momentum ODI series against Australia and our Momentum Proteas women coming so close to reaching the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup final.”
The West Indies Women currently ranked seventh (7th) in the ICC Women’s Championship.
The top three teams from the Women’s Qualifier will qualify to the ICC Women’s World Cup 2021 due to take place in February in New Zealand.
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