Issue is not so much the teams as the crowds: Australia Sport Minister

Australia Sports Minister Richard Colbeck has said the main factor with regards to the World T20 later in the year is whether hosting the T20 World Cup in empty stadiums would be worth it.

"I'd love to see an Australia-India Test series this summer and I'd really like to be able to see the World Cup go ahead.

"... the issue is not so much the teams as the crowds and that's probably one of the hurdles we really have to consider and probably one that world cricket will look at pretty closely as well," Colbeck told SEN Radio on Monday.

All cricket has come to a halt amid the COVID-19 pandemic which has gripped the world. The Indian Premier League (IPL) has been postponed and there is also question marks on the T20 World Cup scheduled in October-November.

Colbeck said logistics of hosting the meet in the post COVID-19 world can be dealt with.

"We all know the difference in atmosphere ... but in a team sense I'd like to think that we can build some protocols with the cooperation of the sport and the players, that's going to be extremely important, with appropriate quarantine and bio-security protocols to see if we can make the competition go ahead."

Besides the World Cup, India's tour of Australia is slated to begin with a T20 tri-series in October and end with a four-match Test series in December.

Australia is thinking about making travel exemptions for the Indian team's tour Down Under to save the cricket board for the financial loss but Colbeck said they need to be careful in expanding exemptions to other nations for the T20 World Cup.

"Those conversations are being had, discussions about what the protocols might look like," Colbeck said.

"They will be difficult because one of the things that has been a key part of our success is that we limited access to Australia from areas where there were significant outbreaks of COVID-19 and that's contributed to the low rate of spread we have now.

"But we would have to be prepared to consider appropriate plans put forward by the various codes."