 "IPL 2025: How India's packed calendar complicates Indian Premier League's resumption for BCCI")
Discussions on the resumption of the 2025 Indian Premier League (IPL) are starting to pick up pace with the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) conducting a meeting on Sunday, two days after putting the ongoing season on hold and a day after India and Pakistan agreed to a ceasefire that was mediated by the United States.
Despite Pakistan violating ceasefire just hours after arriving at a truce with India and the danger that such an act entails as far as peace in the Indian subcontinent is concerned, the board remains confident of getting the league back on track this week .
Also Read | IPL 2025 Live Updates: BCCI reportedly eyeing 16-30 May for remaining IPL matches
A report on The Indian Express mentions 16-30 May as the revised dates for the BCCI to conduct the remaining 16 matches of the 18th IPL season – including the four playoffs.
“Ceasefire has just been announced. We now explore the possibility of resuming and concluding the IPL. If it is possible to conduct it immediately… We need to work out the venue dates and everything, and we would now be speaking to all the stakeholders, including team owners, broadcasters, and everyone involved and find a way as to how to move forward.
“Most importantly, we will have to consult with the government,” IPL chairman Arun Dhumal was quoted by the newspaper as saying on Saturday.
How India’s packed calendar and FTP complicates IPL resumption for BCCI
It will be a major success for the BCCI should they execute their plan of conducting the remaining matches of the ongoing IPL season by in two-week window between 16-30 May, regardless of whether the board and the franchises are able to convince the foreign players who have already returned home for the final leg of the season or not.
Conducting the IPL 2025 final by 30 May might make things a little tight for Australian and South African cricketers given they will have less than two weeks to recover from the gruelling IPL and prepare for the ICC World Test Championship final that gets underway at the Lord’s from 11 June.
Impact Shorts
More ShortsSenior Indian cricketers who will be part of the action in the five-match Test series in England will have just about enough time to get their bodies rested before the marquee assignment that gets the 2023-25 World Test Championship cycle underway.
The BCCI, however, faces a massive headache in case India and Pakistan renew their hostilities and armed forces from both sides continue exchanging fire. And that is due to the packed calendar that lies ahead for India this year.
The England Test series begins on 20 June and is set to conclude on 4 August. Two weeks later, India are scheduled to visit Bangladesh for three ODIs and as many T20Is from 17 to 31 August. The Asia Cup is tentatively scheduled to take place in the month of September but with its ongoing tensions with Pakistan, there are doubts over where the tournament will even go ahead as planned or not.
India’s schedule gets even more cramped from October to December, during which they host West Indies for two Tests and South Africa for a multi-format series and travel to Australia for three ODIs and five T20Is.
The only realistic window for India during this period thus is in September, in which they will have to depend on Asia Cup’s cancellation. And given the fact that it is scheduled to take place in the T20 format this year, the tournament would have been an important one in its preparation for next year’s T20 World Cup, which it co-hosts with Sri Lanka where the Suryakumar Yadav-led Men in Blue get ready to defend their title.
The BCCI’s best bet, thus is for the remaining 16 games to take place by the end of this month. The board will be praying things between the two nuclear-armed nations don’t get any worse that what has already transpired so far.
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