cricket

Updated: Nov 02, 2019 14:50 IST

The Delhi and District Association decided to ‘water out’ the smog surrounding the Arun Jaitley Stadium ahead of the first India-Bangladesh T20I on Sunday. A day before the series opening T20I, the DDCA arranged a tanker to splash water all around the stadium in an effort to settle the dust that has been adding to the degrading air quality of in the surroundings.

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A big hose pipe was used to wash the road leading to the gate no. 1,2,3 and 6 of the Arun Jaitley Stadium. Water was splashed on the trees, the stadium walls, the adjacent park and also the Virender Sehwag gate and Anjum Chopra gate.

. @delhi_cricket splashing water to settle the dust ahead of 1st T20I pic.twitter.com/SK7U370YA5 — Aritra Mukherjee (@aritram029) November 2, 2019

There has been growing concerns over the first T20I after the Air Quality Index breached severe and severe+ category many times in the last few days. The conditions are such that the Delhi government was forced to shut down schools till November 5.

BCCI, however, decided to give a green signal to match as newly elected BCCI president Sourav Ganguly said last minute changes were not possible.

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“We have spoken to Delhi authorities in the last two days. They are expecting the match to go through. It could not be cancelled in the last minute,” Ganguly had said.

“We came in on the October 28 and it was too late to do anything, Lot of preparation go in matches. I hope it goes through. Post Diwali is a difficult time in the North. There is smoke and dust and everything, in future when we schedule matches in North at this time of the year, we have to be a bit more practical,” the BCCI chief added.

On Friday a number of Bangladesh cricketers and support staff members were seen wearing masks to cope with the poor quality. Bangladesh coach Russell Domingo complained of dizziness and breathing problem but stated that they had no choice but to play the match in these conditions.

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The players have just got on with the game and haven’t complained too much about it,” Domingo told reporters. “It’s only three hours so it’s going to be easy. There maybe scratchy eyes, sore throat but that’s ok. No one is dying.”

India stand-in captain Rohit Sharma, for his part, said there shouldn’t be any problems on Sunday.

“We didn’t have any problem when we played the Test match here (against Sri Lanka). We are not aware of the exact discussion and I haven’t had any problem,” he added.