CA may incur huge loss of 80mn $ if T20WC is postponed
Saturday, 30 May 2020 (13:17 IST)
Melbourne:Cricket Australia on Friday said the likely postponement of the Twenty20 World Cup will have a big impact on boards financial position with a revenue loss of AUD 80 million due to coronavirus pandemic.
Briefing reporters on Friday Roberts conceded there is a "very high risk" of the tournament, which Australia is slated to host this October and November, being stalled because of the ongoing coronavirus threat across the globe restricting travel plans of cricketers.
"We have been hopeful all along that it could be staged in October-November but you would have to say there's a very high risk about the prospect of that happening," Roberts said.
The ICC on Thursday in its meeting deferred the decision on fate of T20 World Cup till June 10, saying it wants to explore various contingency options in light of the rapidly changing public health situation caused by the virus.
Roberts said CA stands to lose AUD 20m from not hosting the cup as scheduled, with an added AUD 50m blow from not having crowds attend games this summer. In addition, CA will spend around AUD 10m on biosecurity measures to ensure international teams can play in Australia this summer.
The CA chief, however, is more confident of hosting the four-Test series against India starting at Brisbane on December 3.
According to the original schedule, India are slated to play at four venues - Brisbane, Adelaide, Sydney and Melbourne - but Roberts said there is every possibility of a tweak in the fixtures.
The schedule has India playing at four venues - the Gabba, Adelaide Oval, the SCG and MCG - but that could yet change.
"That (schedule) assumes that state borders are open to domestic travel," Roberts said. "It may be that circumstances dictate that when the time comes maybe we can only use one or two venues, we really don't know any of that yet.
"There is a lot of variables based on whether we have four venues in four states or as little as one venue in one state," he said.
"There's endless scenarios and possibilities ... we're very optimistic that we will be able to stage the Indian men's tour and the other inbound tours for the season. "But we're realistic enough to know they will look very different to a normal summer," he added.(UNI)
