Windies’ Chief Positive About Summer Test Tour To England
Grave keen for go-ahead to get cricket back in swing
Johnny Grave is optimistic that the West Indies’ summer tour to England will take place.
The Cricket West Indies chief executive, speaking on BBC Radio 5 to former England test cricketers Phil Tufnell and Michael Vaughan yesterday (13 May), said: “We have to be absolutely clear that it’s safe first and foremost.”
With Cricket West Indies comprising 15 Caribbean islands, Grave explained: “If you grow up in a country where the population might only be 70,000, to be thinking the UK has had over 30,000 deaths is a massive figure.”
The three-match Test series, which was scheduled to start on 4 June but postponed until at least July due to the Coronavirus outbreak, would be played without fans and probably staged at a single venue in order for players to stay on site.
The England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) is exploring the use of bio-secure venues and quarantining players, with Hampshire’s Southampton pitch and Lancashire’s Old Trafford the most likely venues should the Test tour take place.
Grave explained: “We said to the ECB we’d want four weeks of preparation before the first Test and we’re right to be optimistic.
“It would be seven weeks of very much training at the ground, staying at the ground and very much being isolated within that hotel environment [for the trio of Test Matches].”
He reiterated: “There will be no coercing players into this Tour.”
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