Australia speedster Pat Cummins spoke out regarding the fate of 13th edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL) which is currently scheduled to start from April 15. Originally, the cash-rich league was scheduled to start from March 29 but the tournament had to be postponed due to the outbreak of Coronavirus.
Cummins, who was picked by Kolkata Knight Riders for a whopping sum of Rs 15.5 cr, revealed he has been in contact with the franchise regarding the fate of the tournament. He stated IPL officials are confident of hosting the event at some point in time but the idea is to keep the risk factor to minimum.
"Everything is changing, literally every single day," Cummins told reporters via videoconference on Friday, as per cricket.com.au. "The last I spoke to (KKR team officials), they said they're still really confident and hopeful it (the IPL) will be on at some stage.
"They obviously haven't cancelled it or anything like that yet. It's still a bit of a holding pattern, so we're in contact with our teams every few days.
"Obviously everyone is still really keen for it to go ahead, but the priority is to minimise risk of (the virus) spreading. It's going to be pretty tight, I think the (Indian) travel ban is in place until April 14 so I don't expect anything too soon to happen."
Cummins became the most expensive overseas player in the history of IPL auctions after he was sold for Rs 15.5 crore to two-time champions KKR in the December auction.
The No.1 Test bowler surpassed Ben Stokes' record to become the most expensive overseas buy. The England all-rounder was previously sold to Rising Pune Supergiant at IPL auctions 2017 at Rs 14.5 crore.
He is also the second costliest among all players in the history of IPL auctions, with only Yuvraj Singh being costlier than him. Yuvraj was bought by Delhi Daredevils (now Delhi Capitals) for Rs 16 crore.
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