Coronavirus outbreak postpones ACC meeting as Sourav Ganguly and other members refuse to travel to Dubai

The final decision on the Asia Cup’s venue will have to wait as the upcoming Asian Cricket Council meeting has been postponed after a few members, including BCCI president Sourav Ganguly, refused to travel to Dubai due to the coronavirus threat. The outbreak has affected almost all the major parts of the world and is showing absolutely no signs of slowing down. According to the latest reports, nearly 90,000 people have been infected by it while over 3,000 have already lost their lives.

The UAE has also failed to keep the outbreak away from their shorts and have reported over 700 cases over the last few days. Consequently, Sourav Ganguly and few other members decided against taking the risk and did not travel to Dubai. Along with Ganguly, BCCI secretary Jay Shah was also set to attend the meeting.

“Ganguly was supposed to leave tonight but the coronavirus scare in the UAE has led to the postponement of the meeting,” a BCCI source was quoted as saying by Scroll.

On the other hand, a Pakistan Cricket Board source said– “The chairman of the PCB, Ehsan Mani, is already in Dubai but CEO Wasim Khan didn’t fly out on Sunday.”

The cricket fraternity was looking forward to the meeting as it would have finally ended all the speculations regarding the venue for the tournament this year. Pakistan were the designated hosts for the tournament scheduled for September, but with the BCCI making it clear that the Indian team would not be able to travel to the neighbouring country owing to security concerns, the organisers got down to exploring other options, one of which was hosting it in Dubai.

BCCI and PCB contradict on the venue for Asia Cup

Earlier this week, PCB chief Ehsan Mani and BCCI chief Sourav Ganguly gave contradicting statements on the venue for the Asia Cup. Ganguly confirmed that Dubai would host the tournament and both India and Pakistan will play in it. But just hours later, Mani stated that nothing has been finalized yet while also saying that the authorities have ‘few options’.

“The Asia Cup is organized for the benefit of the Associate Members. We will take a decision keeping that in mind. A final decision will be taken bearing in mind the interests of all the Asian countries. We have a few options,” Mani told the Indian Express.