The Proteas will return to South Africa from India on Wednesday evening after a cancelled chartered flight due to safety concerns in Dubai, amid criticism and clarification from the ICC regarding travel arrangements. Photo: AFP
Image: AFP
The Proteas will return to South Africa from India on Wednesday evening, after initially being scheduled to arrive on Tuesday morning. It’s been a week since South Africa were eliminated from the T20 World Cup in the semi-finals.
There have been massive delays in the teams returning from the T20 World Cup due to the safety concerns in Dubai, which is the usual route South Africans travelling to or from India would likely take.
The Dubai airport has already been the target of an Iranian attack with escalating tensions in the Middle East conflict.
The Proteas were supposed to take a chartered flight from Kolkata to Johannesburg, but that had to be cancelled at the last minute.
The ICC said in a statement: “ On current arrangements, the South Africa contingent will begin departing for South Africa tonight, with all members expected to have departed within the next 36 hours.
“Of the West Indies contingent, nine members are already travelling to the Caribbean, while the remaining 16 are booked on flights departing India within the next 24 hours. We will provide updates on further departures as confirmed arrangements are in place.”
Proteas player Quinton de Kock saw fit to complain about the situation and suggested favouritism from the ICC without acknowledging the conflict in the region.
“The ICC rejects any suggestion that these decisions have been driven by anything other than safety, feasibility, and welfare. Suggestions otherwise across a variety of media platforms from people uninformed of the situation are as unhelpful as they are incorrect.
“There is no link between arrangements made in the cases of South Africa and the West Indies and those made previously for England or any other nation, which arose from separate circumstances, routing options, and different travel conditions.”