The decision to initially continue the Indian Premier League 2021 tournament despite the surge in Covid-19 cases in India led to a widespread debate. While some were of the view that the tournament should have been suspended earlier, others maintained that IPL provided a much-needed distraction to Indian citizens under lockdown.
But after the IPL bio-bubble was hit with the virus, with several players and staff members testing positive, the IPL Governing Council and BCCI made a joint decision to suspend the tournament.
Former England cricketer Kevin Pietersen, who was on commentary duties on Star Sports during the IPL, believes that continuing the tournament initially was a positive thing as it provided six hours of entertainment to Indian public.
"I definitely bought into the fact that continuing the tournament initially was a positive thing for India. The country is not in a good way but I felt that providing six hours of entertainment each day was certainly a positive thing," Pietersen wrote in his blog on Betway.
"We were doing a job for all of India, creating a show to give people some relief. I thought that the package the players were delivering was fantastic.
{{/usCountry}}"We were doing a job for all of India, creating a show to give people some relief. I thought that the package the players were delivering was fantastic.
{{/usCountry}}"Yes, the wickets were a little slow, certainly in Chennai, but the cricket was still very good.
"Don’t forget that the players and broadcasters are not blind to what was going on in India. There was an awful lot of empathy and desire to help in any way we could, which is why we were so keen to put on the show," he added.
The former England cricketer added that the BCCI and IPL GC had little choice but to suspend the tournament once players and staff members were tested positive for Covid-19 inside the bio-bubble.
"But once players tested positive then there was going to be an awful lot of pressure on the BCCI to postpone the tournament and I do believe that they had little choice," he signed off.