‘Tough times’: Cricketers pull out of India’s IPL over COVID

India’s R Ashwin and three Australian cricketers withdraw from Indian Premier League as India battles devastating surge.

Two Australian cricketers have become the latest players to pull out of the Indian Premier League (IPL), which is taking place despite the country battling a devastating coronavirus surge and rising death rates. The IPL has attracted criticism for continuing even as the country’s healthcare system reels from more than 350,000 daily infections and almost 3,000 deaths a day from the virus. On Monday, Adam Zampa and Kane Richardson’s franchise Royal Challengers Bangalore tweeted that the players are “returning to Australia for personal reasons and will be unavailable for the remainder of #IPL2021”.