Australia-India schedule revealed: WAG cap slapped on Indian team

India’s biggest selection battles may be fought in each player’s household after the government slapped a brutal cap on the numbers allowed in the bubble. See Australia’s bumper cricket schedule here.

ADELAIDE, AUSTRALIA - JANUARY 15: Virat Kohli of India celebrates after reaching his century during game two of the One Day International series between Australia and India at Adelaide Oval on January 15, 2019 in Adelaide, Australia. (Photo by Daniel Kalisz/Getty Images)

The most brutal selection call of the summer could come before Virat Kohli’s superstar team even gets on the plane.

A strict limit has been placed on the number of players’ wives and families who will be allowed into Australia, and it’s now up to Indian officials to nominate the names of loved ones with the most “compelling” cases to make the cut.

Eight or nine members of the Indian Test squad are married, including Kohli, whose wife Anushka Sharma is due to give birth in January – a mysterious due date which is still casting doubt over whether the captain will be available for the entirety of a series not finishing until January 19.

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Cricket Australia boss Nick Hockley said the families of Indian players would need a “compelling case” to be given an exemption to come in by the Federal Government, while NSW Government officials have indicated India may need to play their own game of ‘Family Feud’ to determine who makes the shortlist to enter the Sydney Olympic Park quarantine bubble on November 12.

“We’ve built a provision for some family members to be in the quarantine bubble,” NSW Tourism Minister Stuart Ayres said.

Virat Kohli and Anushka Sharma are due to welcome their first child in January. Picture: Peter PARKS/AFP

“The amount of people that fit into that will be a discussion between Cricket Australia and the Indian cricket authorities. How they make those selections will be determined by those two cricket associations. But ultimately they’ve got to fit into the COVID Safe plan the NSW Government has approved.”

CA announced a bumper schedule which confirmed a historic day-night Test in Adelaide to launch the four-Test series on December 17, before an emotion-charged Boxing Day Test at the MCG.

Early indications are the MCG will be able to accommodate a crowd of 25,000 for freed Melburnians, while the SCG will have a capacity for 23,000 for the limited-overs series from November 27.

Indian officials have indicated that getting families in is a priority because most of their players have been isolated in a bubble in Dubai playing in the IPL for the past 80 days.

However the fact the BCCI has already announced its squads and signed off on the schedule suggests it’s not a deal breaker.

“We’re working that through at the moment with the BCCI and with the Australian Government and (it would) have to be a compelling case obviously for families to come,” Hockley said.

Australian cricket sources say the number of family members India has requested is not extensive, although last year a BCCI official described the massive travelling party which accompanied the team had grown so great in size it’d become a “nightmare” to manage. If Kohli and his wife decided to have their baby in Australia – as David and Candice Warner chose to do in England last year, it would certainly present as a “compelling case”.

Virat Kohli and India will be heading Down Under next month.

But if she goes home to give birth in India, the question then is whether Kohli will choose to leave Australia early to be by her side – a decision which could have a monumental bearing on the series.

The NSW Government will allow the Indian team, and Australia’s returning IPL stars, to quarantine at a hotel at Sydney Olympic Park and train at an isolated cricket facility at Blacktown International Sports Park.

The plan rescued the summer at the eleventh hour after the Queensland Government went cold on the plan.

Minister Ayres slammed Queensland for once again putting the preservation of their upcoming State election ahead of doing what’s right with COVID-19.

“I think this is a classic case of Queensland dropping the ball at second slip and NSW picking it up before it hits the ground,” he said.

“I think politics has been driving most decisions in Queensland. Whether that’s been who you let in, or who you don’t let in. I think it’s been entirely driven by the date of the election. It’s been most unfortunate that rather than having a strong focus on collaboration, health and data driving those decisions, it’s been political.

“No doubt there’s millions of dollars of economic activity that comes from having these events in NSW … so we’re happy to pick that up at a time when our tourism, accommodation and hospitality sector has been completely devastated by COVID.”

Originally published as Australia-India schedule revealed: WAG cap slapped on Indian team