West Indies captain Jason Holder as well as former head coach, Floyd Reifer, believe the side is safe with the measures taken by England Cricket Board (ECB) for their Three-Test series amid the Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.
Holder, in his first press conference since the side arrived in England said, “To be honest I feel pretty safe, I must commend the ECB, they have been outstanding so far…you know we had a chartered airline aircraft to bring us over so arriving her yesterday [Tuesday] in Manchester was pretty smooth we just transitioned from the plane directly through the VIP arrival hall and from there directly to the buses and straight to the hotel so we had no real interface with anyone from the public obviously just the workers at the airport and here at the hotel as well so I feel pretty safe.”
Holder acknowledged that everyone knew what the situation would be being the first international team to travel amid the pandemic and what the possibilities could be.
“Before coming here to England we all knew what was being posed as I said earlier. It was a situation of constant dialogue as to what a possible series would look like over here in the UK and at no point in time did we force anybody to come, everybody had their free will and I just think it is a case where at some point or the other we had to resume some kind of normalcy,” Holder said.
He added, “we have been assured by the ECB that relevant protocols have been put in place and so far since we have gotten here everything has been smooth…yes at the end of the day it is not going to be the normal bi-lateral series here in England but at the end of the day this is where we are with the state of world cricket and the state of the world per se…”
Meanwhile, Reifer, who has taken up a new role as batting coach, is with the side and spoke to popular Barbados radio programme Mason and Guests where he stated, “I have no concerns, I’m a positive person and I just believe once you adhere to the protocols, wash your hands and do all the necessary things you’ve been hearing for the last six months everything will be ok.”
The former West Indies skipper went on to theorize, “A lot of people are worried about the COVID situation but I think the ECB has put a lot of things in place, put a lot of measures in place to keep us safe, when we get there we are going to be in a bubble no one in no one out so I think we are going to be safe.”
