ICC to expand men's 50 over World Cup to 14 teams; hold World T20 every two years in next cycle
Dubai, Jun 1: The T20 World Cup will be held every two years during the next eight-year Futures Tours & Programme (FTP) cycle while the 50-over event will be a 14-team affair from the 2027 edition, the game's governing body ICC said on Tuesday.
Also as per PTI's earlier report, the World Test Championship will have four editions in the next cycle apart from two Champions Trophy.
"The ICC Board today confirmed the schedule of ICC events from 2024-2031 with both the men's Cricket World Cup and men's T20 World Cup to be expanded and a men's Champions Trophy to be re-introduced," the global body said in a release issued after the board meeting.
"The men's Cricket World Cup will become a 14 team, 54-match event in 2027 and 2031, whilst the men's T20 World Cup will be expanded to a 20 team, 55-match event in 2024, 2026, 2028 and 2030."
The 50-over format currently is a 10-team event while this edition of T20 World Cup will be a 16-team affair.
"An eight team Champions Trophy will be hosted in 2025 and 2029. ICC World Test Championship Finals will be hosted in 2025, 2027, 2029 and 2031. The ICC Women's event schedule has already been confirmed with the expansion of both the Cricket World Cup and T20 World Cup forming part of the ICC's long-term commitment to growing the women's game," it further stated.
The men's World Cup format will have two groups of seven, with the top three in each group progressing to a Super Six stage, followed by semi-finals and final.
This is the same format that was used in the 2003 edition. The format of the T20 World Cup will consist of four groups of five, with the top two from each group going through to a Super Eights stage, followed by the knockout stages of semi-finals and a final.
The Champions Trophy will follow previous editions with two groups of four, semi-finals and final.
ICC announces expansion of global events.
— ICC (@ICC) June 1, 2021
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Champions Trophy opening on Feb 16 or 17; PCB hopeful Rohit Sharma will be there
Lahore, Jan 15 (PTI): The opening ceremony of the Champions Trophy will be held either on February 16 or 17 and the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) is confident that India captain Rohit Sharma will be in attendance at the event.
The PCB source also said that it is awaiting communication from the ICC on the schedule of the customary captains' photo-shoot and the pre-event press conference.
The eight-team tournament will get underway on February 19 in Karachi. However, India will play all their matches in Dubai, starting with the clash against Bangladesh on February 20, after refusing to travel to Pakistan owing to security concerns.
The source said PCB has procured all relevant clearances from its government to promptly issue visas to all captains, players and team officials who will come here for pre-tournament events.
"This obviously includes Rohit or any other Indian team player or official or board official," he added.
Another source confirmed to PTI that the PCB has made it clear to the ICC that the opening ceremony, featuring all teams and their captains, will take place in Pakistan.
"This is in line with the usual protocols and since the opening match is on 19th the opening ceremony can be expected either on the 16th or 17th," the source added.
He said the schedule of the opening ceremony would depend on the warm-up matches list.
The source said that recently three Indian nationals, who were a part of the ICC delegation which came to Pakistan, were promptly issued visas once the world body sent their names to the PCB.
