South Africa Women Emerging team to fly back early from Bangladesh

The visitors plan to return on Monday before a stricter lockdown is imposed in Bangladesh

South Africa Emerging Women’s tour of Bangladesh has been cut short by one game after the visitors decided to leave the country on April 12 before a stricter lockdown is enforced from April 14, which was their originally-scheduled departure date. The South African team will not play their last scheduled game on April 13.

“The last match will not be held due to the lockdown,” Shafiul Alam Nadel, the women’s wing chairman of BCB, said. “They are hoping to leave Bangladesh by tomorrow (April 12). There won’t be any flights due to the lockdown, which is why they are leaving before their last match. The decision has been taken after discussion between BCB and CSA.”

The visitors have so far played four one-day matches against the hosts and lost all of them. They were initially scheduled to fly back from Dhaka on April 14, but efforts are now being made to put them on a flight by April 12 so that they can avoid getting stranded in Bangladesh.

The country’s civil aviation authority announced earlier on Sunday that international flights will be stopped for a week April 14 onwards.

The South Africa women’s team arrived in Bangladesh on March 29 to play five matches in Sylhet. The first four matches were conducted as planned despite the Bangladesh government having announced a lockdown on April 3 effective from April 5, with the BCB keeping both teams under a strict biobubble environment. No crowd was allowed at the matches.

This is the second tour related to Bangladesh cricket to be marred by the April 14 lockdown announcement. The Pakistan Under-19’s tour of Bangladesh was called off on Saturday, which included one four-day game and five Youth ODIs in Sylhet and Dhaka. Last week, the BCB had also postponed the National Cricket League, Bangladesh’s domestic first-class competition.

The surge of Covid-19 cases over the last four weeks has resulted in the current lockdown and a stricter one from next week. According to the Directorate General of Health Services, 78 people died on Sunday – the highest in a day so far – which is one more than Saturday’s figure, itself a record number. There were also 5819 Covid-19 cases reported on Sunday in Bangladesh.