The International Cricket Council on Monday postponed the ICC Twenty20 World Cup in Australia for a year due to the ongoing global COVID-19 pandemic.
The decision to deter the tournament, scheduled to take place from October 18 to November 15, was announced after a meeting of the IBC Board, the commercial subsidiary of the ICC.
The tournament was rescheduled to be held in October- November, 2021 with the final on November 14.
ICC also specified the window of two other men’s tournaments, the Twenty20 World Cup in 2022 and the men’s fifty-over World cup in 2023, to bring clarity to the cricket calendar, which has been put to disarray due to the pandemic.
‘We have undertaken a comprehensive and complex contingency planning exercise and through this process, our number one priority has been to protect the health and safety of everyone involved in the sport,’ ICC chief executive Manu Sawhney was quoted saying in an ICC press release.
‘The decision to postpone the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup was taken after careful consideration of all of the options available to us and gives us the best possible opportunity of delivering two safe and successful T20 World Cups for fans around the world,’ he added.
Swahney hoped this announcement will help the cricket boards around the world revert their focus on bi-lateral series’ and reschedule the cricketing engagements every country has missed out on in the last four months.
‘Our Members now have the clarity they need around event windows to enable them to reschedule lost bilateral and domestic cricket. Moving the Men’s Cricket World Cup to a later window is a critical element of this and gives us a better chance of maintaining the integrity of the qualification processs.
The news didn’t come out as a surprise, as Cricket Australia high ups had previously hinted on multiple occasions that they were not keen to go through with the tournament, which would have teams from 16 nations compete in.
ICC, however, didn’t specify who will host the postponed tournament next year and the Twenty20 World Cup in 2022, which will now be held between October-November 2022 with the final on 13 November.
The world cricket governing board, however, kept India as host for the 2023 ICC World Cup, which will be played in October- November 2023 with the final on November 26.
Bangladesh Cricket Board, who had repeatedly prioritiesd ICC tournaments over bi-lateral series, mutually postponing multiple series’ this year, will now have to find interested teams to either tour or host Bangladesh to fill the remaining part of 2020 with some international cricket for the Tigers. -new age
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