With the general elections of India coinciding with the twelfth edition of the Indian Premier League, the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) had a tough task at hand to assign games to the eight conventional ‘home” cities. Accordingly, the Board had earlier brought out fixtures for only the first two weeks of the tournament. However, the complete schedule of the group stage of IPL 2019 released by the BCCI on Tuesday afternoon, shows that each of the eight franchises with play all its home matches at its regular home venue.
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The news has naturally occasioned joy for all the franchises and the fans alike. Praising the way the BCCI has drawn the fixtures, Kolkata Knight Riders CEO Venky Mysore feels that it’s almost ‘a miracle’. ‘’First and foremost, a big congratulations to the team which has drawn the schedule. They”ve done an amazing job of putting together a schedule in an election year. All the eight franchises will be playing at their home venues, which is amazing!””, Mysore said in a press statement on Tuesday evening.
The KKR CEO has also expressed his gratitude to the Kolkata Police for having reassured him that all of KKR”s home matches would be held in Kolkata only, even prior to the release of the first instalment of the fixtures. “I also have to acknowledge and thank the Kolkata Police, because even before any of these discussions had happened, the first thing that the Commissioner of Police and the Assistant Commissioner of Police told me that they would do everything in their capacity to ensure that our games will be held in Kolkata only, and that we won’t have to go out anywhere, looking for a second home venue, which was so reassuring’’, he added.
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‘’Now when I look at the dates and look at
our travel schedule, and what our expectations were, for this is the election
year, I think it’s almost a miracle that it has been pulled together. So,
fingers crossed and I hope there won’t be any changes to this. It’s a good
schedule and it’s going to be a very exciting IPL for both us and the fans””,
Mysore concluded.
The Knights will open their campaign with the
game against Sunrisers Hyderabad at the Eden Gardens on March 24.
