EXCLUSIVE: KKR Member Says Pat Cummins Has Not Contracted Covid; Players Under Quarantine In Ahmedabad Hotel

ABP LIVE Bengali has come to know from the KKR camp itself that all the other members of the team have been quarantined in their respective rooms in Team Hotel at Ahmedabad where they are playing matches now.

Kolkata: Two players of Kolkata Knight Riders have been tested Covid positive. The news has come as a bolt from the blue in the KKR camp as the team is obeying a strict bio bubble rule.

The players and support staffs have no clue about how two among them can be infected in spite of staying within the strict Bio Bubble rules, which was tightened further last week as the second wave of Coronavirus in India lead some of the players, both Indian and foreigners, to withdraw from playing in IPL this year.

ABP LIVE Bengali has come to know from the KKR camp itself that all the other members of the team have been quarantined in their respective rooms in Team Hotel at Ahmedabad where they are playing matches now. The KKR players and support staff will go through daily Covid tests from now on for the coming one week at least, if not more. The BCCI and IPL Governing Council as well as the Franchise owners are trying to ensure that no further infection spreads.

BCCI, in a statement circulated Monday afternoon, writes: "IPL reschedules KKR-RCB match slated for May 3, 2021, after 2 KKR players test positive. Varun Chakaravarthy and Sandeep Warrier were found to be positive in the third round of testing in the last four days. All other team members have tested negative for Covid -19. Both the players have isolated themselves from the rest of the squad. The Medical Team is in continuous touch with the duo and is monitoring their health".

“We are quite panic-stricken at this point in time. We are following all the Bio Bubble norms strictly and there is no escape. The BCCI, like last time, has provided us with GPS activated chip which we have to carry all the time. At the same time, strict monitoring on the movement of all the players and supports staffs is going on 24 X 7. So there is no question that those infected players have violated the rule,” one from the KKR camp tells ABP LIVE Bengali over a phone call on condition of anonymity.

He further added, “Even other boarders of the Hotel can not reach out to the players with the request of selfie or autographs. We are in three-layer security in Bio Bubble where a number of persons are monitoring us. It means they got affected within the Bio Bubble with no fault of their own. There is certainly a reason behind this. Maybe the infection spread via people assigned to sanitize our hotel or dressing room at the stadium as we don’t know about the rules they have to follow in Bio Bubble. However, we are worried about the situation. Everybody has been asked to get them quarantined in our respective rooms in the hotel. A daily Covid test will go on now.”

There is speculation of Pat Cummins getting infected by Covid. But one member of the KKR squad said that the Aussie pacer just has an upset stomach due to some food poisoning. “We were having our dinner at the rooftop of our hotel the day Ahmedabad saw a sand storm. Food poisoning may have been caused then,” the member told ABP LIVE Bengali.