West Indies Cricket Team

For abandoning their India tour midway

The West Indies cricket team recently abandoned their India tour after the fourth one-day international (ODI) in Dharamshala, with one ODI, a Twenty20 and three Test matches still to go, resulting in a loss of 17 days of cricket.

The pull-out occurred because of a row between the cricket team and the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) over a new MoU between the Board and the players. Although the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) tried to intervene and even warned them that there would be consequences, the impasse couldn’t be broken and the tour was abandoned. Both WICB and the players failed to appreciate the ill effects of such a drastic decision.

The BCCI has replaced the abandoned matches with five ODIs against Sri Lanka next month, but it still stands to lose, media reports say, about $65 million in revenue. But the BCCI has now suspended all bilateral tours to West Indies. India was expected to play five series against West Indies over the next eight years, including four visits to the Caribbean. The Indian Board will reportedly also be initiating legal proceedings against the WICB. The players will probably be suspended, or worse, banned for life from international level cricket.

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