One in India Camp Tests COVID-19 Positive; Ganguly Hopes Test Will be Played
India lead the five-match Test series by 2-1 with Manchester being the final Test.
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On the eve of the fifth and final Test between India and England at Old Trafford, the visiting team's physio Yogesh Parmar has tested positive for COVID-19.
The latest positive test is said to have emerged after the round of testing from Wednesday. The RT-PCR test reports of the players are still awaited.
The Indian Express reported that the team and BCCI have spoken and they aren’t keen to go ahead with the final Test, keeping in mind the IPL which begins on 19 September in UAE.
"We don't know if match will happen at the moment. Hopefully we can get some game," Sourav Ganguly was quoted as saying by PTI.
The Indian team have cancelled their training session for Thursday. Virat Kohli and co had trained on Wednesday.
Ravi Shastri, Bharat Arun and R Sridhar, the head coach, bowling coach and fielding coach respectively, had earlier tested positive for the virus. The trio had not traveled with the team to Manchester and instead stayed back in London.
The final Test begins on 10 September, with India leading by 2-1 in the five-match series.
According to the UK government rules, those who return positive RT-PCR tests have to isolate for ten days and return two negative tests.
India, who have been on a long tour of UK, have had to deal with more than one COVID-19 incident on the tour. This is the second time that Bharat Arun has been affected after July, when along with Wriddhiman Saha and Abhimanyu Easwaran had to isolate for 10 days. They had been identified as close contacts of net bowler Dayanand Garani, who had tested positive on 14 July.
Before that as well, Indian wicket-keeper Rishabh Pant had tested positive for COVID-19 after he had visited The Wembley to watch Euros.
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