ICC postpones T20 World Cup: The seventh season of the ICC T20 World Cup has been eventually postponed by the global body.
Advertisement
ICC (International Cricket Council) has finally postponed the seventh edition of the ICC T20 World Cup 2020 citing COVID-19 threat.
Originally slated to be played in Australia in October-November this year, the world event faced a daunting challenge from the novel COVID-19 pandemic. The idea of organizing a 16-team world tournament amidst a global crisis was being spoken against for months now.
In addition to Cricket Australia Chairman Earl Eddings and Pakistan Cricket Board Chairman Ehsan Mani, a Cricket Australia letter to ICC was also meant at delaying the world event by a year according to The Times of India a couple of months ago.
ICC postpones T20 World Cup 2020
ICC Chief Executive Manu Sawhney said: “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.
“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.”
While ICC has postponed this year’s T20 World Cup by a year, it is still unclear whether India will continue to host next year’s T20 World Cup or not. Originally scheduled to host the world event in 2021, India might now get to host the T20 World Cup in 2022 as ICC Cricket World Cup 2023 has been delayed to October-November 2023.
Earlier, it was being speculated that Australia would host the 2022 edition as India wouldn’t want to host two world events (T20 and ODI World Cup) within a span of six months.
As IPL Chairman Brijesh Patel had mentioned more than a month ago, the postponement of the T20 World Cup will allow the BCCI (Board of Control for Cricket in India) to confirm the fixtures IPL 2020.
