World Cup 2019: Ganguly comes up with a solution to stop further rain washouts

Speaking during the coverage of India vs New Zealand match at Nottingham, Ganguly said the situation can be solved by changing the covers

Former India captain Sourav Ganguly has come up with a good solution to stop any further ICC World Cup 2019 games getting abandoned because of rain. Speaking during the coverage of India vs New Zealand match at Nottingham, Ganguly said the situation can be solved by changing the covers. International Cricket Council (ICC) is facing fire on the social media platform for poor scheduling of the mega cricketing event. So far, four matches have already got abandoned without a ball being bowled and one match was rain-curtailed. “The covers that are used in India, at the Eden Gardens are from England and using them here (in England) would have meant spending half the cost and it is also tax-free, so they should have used those here anyway. In India, we use these covers for all matches, so that when the rain stops the match can resume within 10 minutes. They are very light covers, it’s not difficult to lift it, You don’t need too much manpower. The blue covers that were used earlier in India used to take more than 10 times the time and people in comparison to now,” Ganguly told the official broadcasters. Ganguly also went on to explain covers that are in Eden Gardens and in Lord’s are translucent covers, so light goes past it. “The covers that are in Eden Gardens and in Lord’s are translucent covers, so light goes past it. This way the grass won’t dry up nor will the colour change from green to brown, if you use them to cover the outfield. For such important matches, and in a tournament like the World Cup — especially in a country like England where the rains are so frequent, having these covers are very important, especially on the outfield as well,” Ganguly explained. Ganguly, however, admitted that the India-New Zealand encounter on Thursday on had not been possible as it has been raining for the past three days. “Today’s case is different, the match was called off not only because of the rain today — but it has been raining continuously for the past three days. The two reasons for the delay were firstly, the wet pitch and secondly, something that the viewers on screen can’t see is how dark the ground is, the match can’t begin in such a dark setting,” Ganguly added.