This is a crucial phase, stay indoors: Shastri

"Stay indoors people. Crucial phase this. Only thing flying around the world like a tracer bullet is this bloody Corona (Covid-19). Stay in before the bugger gets you," Shastri wrote on his Twitter handle.

The COVID-19 pandemic has claimed over 30,000 lives so far while infecting more than 6.5 lakh people.

In India, 25 deaths have already been reported apart from more than 1000 positive cases.

Among other things, it led to the Olympics getting pushed back by a year. The Indian Premier League (IPL) also got postponed. Chennai Super Kings and defending champions Mumbai Indians were supposed to clash swords at the Wankhede Stadium on this day with MS Dhoni making his much anticipated comeback after a break since he last played in the 2019 World Cup semifinal loss against New Zealand.

Shastri had said on Saturday that Virat Kohli is the "boss" of the Indian team who leads from the front in each and every aspect of the game.

The captain is the boss, I always believe that," Shastri said on the Sky Sports Podcast, responding to a question from Nasser Hussain.

"The job of the coaching staff is to prepare the guys in the best possible way to get out there and play positive, brave, fearless cricket.

"The captain leads from the front. Yes, we are there to take off the burden -- he's not going to each player and talking to them, that's my job; if you've got to pull someone up -- but you leave him to do his job in the middle."The captain sets the tone and is encouraged to set the tone. In the middle, he controls the show. No coach in the world can do that," he added.