IPL 2020: England, Australia players to be available for KKR from first match, says CEO Venky Mysore

England and Australian players will be available for selection for Kolkata Knight Riders’ (KKR) first match in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2020, franchise CEO Venky Mysore has said. 

KKR start their IPL 2020 campaign on September 23 and England and Australian players are set to arrive in the UAE on September 17 and even if they undergo six-day quarantine period as per BCCI SOP, they will be available to participate in KKR’s season opener. 

The English and Australian players are set to be flown into the UAE on a chartered flight and as per many, it won’t be breach of the bio-secure bubble. 

"While they are still negotiating with the authorities, we are reconciled to the fact that we may have to quarantine our three players," ESPNcricinfo quoted Mysore as saying.

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"They arrive on September 17, but our first game is on September 23, by which time they would've finished their [concessional six-day] quarantine. So it's worked out well, and it's good for the tournament," he added.

KKR have three players in their squad who are participating in the ongoing England vs Australia limited-overs series – Eoin Morgan, Tom Banton and Pat Cummins. 

"What we did was put a plan together and shared it with the medical team at the IPL. We told them, 'they're in a bio-secure bubble in the UK," Mysore said.

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"What if we brought them on a sanitised charter flight and we took care of all the elements of immigration, testing, contactless stuff and everything to allow them to come right into a bubble here?' To give credit to IPL, they took it very constructively and they have a written Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) for that, which says if you're coming from a bubble to another bubble, you don't need the mandatory quarantine period," he added.

Indian Premier League 2020 is set to commence from September 19 with the final scheduled for November 10 in the UAE.