India captain Virat Kohli on Thursday said he expects to get more clarity from the BCCI on the upcoming tour of South Africa in the next couple of days and does not want to be left “confused” following the emergence of the new COVID-19 variant — Omicron.
It is understood that head coach Rahul Dravid has initiated a conversation within the group and is also keeping the players abreast about what’s happening at the administrative level.
Kohli was addressing the media on the eve of the second and final Test against New Zealand here from Friday.”You want to seek clarity as soon as possible, so we have spoken to all the senior members of the squad. Obviously Rahul bhai (Dravid) has initiated a conversation within the group, which is very important to know,” Kohli said when asked about his and the team’s view on the tour.
“At the end of the day, we understand, I mean our focus from the Test match will not shift regardless, but also know that you would want to have clarity and you want to be in a situation where you know exactly what’s going on.”
There are talks about the tour being pushed back or the schedule curtailed given the panic caused by the new variant. Kohli said that in another two days, everything will be clear.”We have been talking to the board and we are pretty confident within a day or two or pretty soon, we will have absolute clarity as to what is going on,” he said.The skipper made it clear that these are not normal times and any decision taken should factor in that aspect.
“Well, look it’s pretty natural, I mean, we are not playing in normal times anyways, so there is a lot of planning that’s involved, there is a lot of preparation that is involved in terms of understanding exactly what’s going to go on,” he said.South Africa has been hit by travel bans following its discovery of omicron variant even though an India A team is currently playing a three-game first-class series in Bloemfontein.
