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Delhi Pollution: Twitter Seems To Care More About Players' Health Than The BCCI

Sourav Ganguly has said that the opening T20 against Bangladesh won't be cancelled amid concerns over growing air pollution in Delhi.
Team India prepares for T20I vs Bangladesh.
Twitter/BCCI
Team India prepares for T20I vs Bangladesh.

The first India-Bangladesh T20I won’t be cancelled or moved out of Delhi, BCCI chief Sourav Ganguly has clarified amid concerns over growing air pollution.

A group of environmentalists had written a letter to Ganguly, urging him to consider moving the match outside of Delhi. Care For Air and My Right To Breathe, in the letter, said making the cricketers play in the toxic air will end up doing more damage to their health in the long run and the spectators will also be putting themselves at risk.

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“It’s too late to do anything, because a lot of preparations go into matches like tickets, crowds everything. So it’s not possible to cancel things at the last minute. Fingers crossed,” Ganguly said, according to PTI. He, however, added that they would be more ‘practical’ in the future.

Bangladesh batsman Liton Das was seen wearing a mask during their first practice session ahead of Sunday’s match. He later said he was not feeling well then, according to Hindustan Times. Another report said that three cricketers of the Bangladesh cricket team and a support staff member were spotted wearing masks.

ANI also shared a video of the practice session:

India’s stand-in captain Rohit Sharma on Thursday said he doesn’t expect any pollution-related problem during Bangladesh T20 on Sunday.

Sharma said it won’t be a problem. “We didn’t have any problem when we played the Test match here (against Sri Lanka). We are not aware of the exact discussion and I haven’t had any problem,” PTI quoted him as saying.

Air quality dipped to emergency levels in the national capital on Friday and the Supreme Court-mandated pollution control body EPCA declared a public health emergency.

BCCI also shared a picture from Team India’s practice session and several Twitter users expressed concern over the pollution.

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This article exists as part of the online archive for HuffPost India, which closed in 2020. Some features are no longer enabled. If you have questions or concerns about this article, please contact indiasupport@huffpost.com.