Coronavirus enters Bangladesh cricket camp as its spin-bowling coach Rangana Herath has contracted Covid-19 in New Zealand. Owing to the severity of the issue, a total of nine members of the Bangladesh team, including support staff and players, are asked to undergo an extended quarantine.
“Herath is Corona positive and will be doing extended quarantine till he is cleared,” Bangladesh Cricket Board’s cricket operations chairman, Akram Khan, said on Wednesday (December 15).
“Look there was a corona positive in the plane and a couple of members of our squad along with Herath were in close with him. They are asked to do quarantine while Herath was found positive from them,” he said.
''Other members of the squad have already been freed to practice from today though they could not do so due to rain after completing their mandatory quarantine period. The rest (who are asked to quarantine) will join them after obtaining a corona negative result following their quarantine period they were asked to complete,” he further added.
It was also learnt that pace-bowling coach Ottis Gibson is unwell due to a stomach problem.
BCB officials said that they will play an intra-squad two-day practice game on December 22-23 while the tourists will play another practice game against New Zealand A from December 28-29.
Bangladesh and New Zealand will play a two-Test match series against New Zealand starting from January 1, 2022.
The opening Test is scheduled to be played at the Bay Oval in Tauranga.
The second Test will be played from January 9. Due to a quarantine relaxation in New Zealand, Bangladesh will also get the opportunity to play a couple of two-day practice games.
Bangladesh have arrived in New Zealand, and things are not going great for the Tigers. Earlier, Shakib Al Hasan requested BCB to allow him to skip this series, and the board accepted his request.
The former Sri Lanka spinner Herath played his last Test match against England in November 2018 and in a span of 93 Tests he had scalped a total of 433 wickets.
