IPL not worth playing at risk to life: Doull

BANGALORE - Former New Zealand fast bowler Simon Doull has said that participating in the Indian Premier League (IPL) is not worth the risk to your life, after two low-intensity bombs went outside the M. Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bangalore.

Doull, who was in the stadium to commentate on the match between Mumbai Indians and Royal Challengers Bangalore, described the incident as “one of the most bizarre and frightening things I’ve ever experienced”.

“I was standing next to Andy Bichel (former Australian cricketer) and when we heard the first explosion we just looked at each other and went ‘what’s going on here’. You couldn’t mistake that sound for anything else,” Stuff.co.nz quoted Doull, as saying.

“It was one of those sounds, while I had never heard it before, you just knew was a bomb,” he added.

He further said that he was not happy with the IPL organizers, and raised questions if the match should have been played despite the blasts.

“At first, I think the players were a bit concerned about playing. There was never a public announcement or anything like that as far as I heard. I don’t know whether the game should have ever been played or not,” Doull said.

“When we got back to the hotel and discovered that another bomb - the biggest one of the lot - had been discovered, we started to wonder whether we should have gone ahead with the match,” he added.

Doull has one more match to commentate in New Delhi on Sunday, and will fly back home to New Zealand, as originally planned, on Monday. (ANI)