Sanitisation breaks, bowing with folded hands
   Date :23-May-2020

Games like cricket basket
Gone are days when players used to celebrate and jostle while tackling in team sports. Games like cricket, basketball, football hockey, will have to device new ways to maintain social distancing while playing. Bridge, chess, carrom players might keep sanitisers and use them
during their matches. (File photos)
 
 
 
By Paritosh Pramanik :
 
The new norm of sports post COVID-19 
 
SPORTS would not be the same post COVID-19. A lot will change, though not in the format or rules in any particular sport, but in the way it will be played. The coronavirus pandemic, which has halted all the sporting events for past two months, will make a big impact in the style of playing as well as celebrating. The unknown, invisible disease has forced mankind to maintain social distancing and has made masks part of their life in an attempt to break the chain of the spread of the virus. But once the lockdowns and curfews are lifted, the sporting ‘rules’ will have to be tweaked, for the betterment and safety of players and officials alike. Sportspersons playing contact sports like football, cricket, hockey, basketball, kabaddi, kho-kho, to name a few, will have to be extra cautious while plying their trade.
 
Though wearing facemasks during matches might not be advisable as it may block oxygen intake, hugging each other, chest-busting, giving hi-fives during celebrations will have to be pushed back for a year or two. Players will have to devise new ideas of celebration while also maintaining social distancing. That would be a fun to watch. Bowing with folded hands might be the new celebrating style. In football, like hydration breaks at half-time, sanitisation breaks will have to be introduced where players will have to apply sanitisers on their hands.
 
This won’t add any extra time. During injury break or when a team gets a free kick, players could be allowed to use the time to sanitise themselves on the sidelines, just like they sip water in that little passage of duration. Similarly, as coaches would also vouch for, first-time passes will have to be enforced upon to maintain distance from each other. The more quickly ball is released, the less danger of getting in contact with another player. Even the referees might start using sanitisers after awarding a free kick and during breaks. According to new ICC guidelines there will neither be loo breaks during training nor the players will be allowed to hand over their caps or sunglasses to the on-field umpires. But a bottle of sanitiser might be handed over to umpires who would drop a few drops on players hands between the overs. Sanitiser bottles can be put on the boundary lines as well just like water bottles. Hockey players would be asked to use sanitisers while substitution.
 
A sanitiser bottle can be placed just near the changing line where player can use them while going inside the playing field or while getting substitute. Coaches will have to keep sanitiser bottles ready with them during the matches. Basketball players too can use to the time between each quarter to sanitise themselves. Again, releasing the ball immediately would be the norm in basketball too to avoid attracting any player too close. In track and field events, it will be a Herculean task for officials to keep the equipment like shot puts, javelins, discuses infection-free. For that, they would have to keep on spraying disinfectants after every round of competition.
 
As far as badminton, tennis and table tennis are concerned, there won’t be much a problem of sanitisation of players. With no contact between two shuttlers, the time used to change the sides and after each game could be used to rub sanitisers on hands. Even the little breaks when players gulp a couple of hydrated drinks can be utilised for the same. Only a few seconds would be added in the duration of breaks. Same can be done with table tennis and tennis. In chess and carrom, players would be allowed to carry sanitiser bottles during competitions. A chess player can use them frequently after moves while in carrom a player can use it at the end of each board. Same can be applied to bridge players. The card-game is mostly played by senior citizens and they will have to take extra precaution by keeping sanitisers on the table and use them after every game. This, and many other changes, would be expected when the lockdown period ends. It might look a bit unnatural in the beginning but definitely will be a fun to watch players celebrating in unique ways.