Australia postpone South Africa tour amid pandemic

Cricket Australia (CA) have postponed their Test tour of South Africa over health concerns.

Australia were set to depart for a three-Test series later this month but CA’s Interim Chief Executive Nick Hockley said going to South Africa posed an “unacceptable” risk to the Aussies.

“Following extensive due diligence with medical experts, it has become clear that traveling from Australia to South Africa at this current time poses an unacceptable level of health and safety risk to our players, support staff and the community,” Hockley said in a statement.

“We acknowledge the significant amount of work by CSA in planning for the tour, during which we made it clear that CA was prepared to take on additional cost and effort to make the series happen,” he added.

“This decision has not been made lightly and we are extremely disappointed, especially given the importance of continuing international cricket at this time, our valued relationship with CSA, and our aspirations to compete in the inaugural ICC World Test Championship,” he further stated.

The tour was originally scheduled for February and March, but the dates had yet to be confirmed due to Covid-19 pandemic.