On Tuesday, Cricket Australia (CA) chairman Earl Eddings admitted that staging the ICC T20 World Cup this year amid the global pandemic is “unrealistic”. The tournament is scheduled to take place from October 18th to November 15th, and officials have previously stated that they plan to continue on those dates. But with many global borders still closed due to travel restrictions related to owing to COVID-19 disease, Eddings conceded that it looked increasingly unlikely.
While speaking to the reporters, Eddings said, “While it hasn’t been formally called off this year, or postponed, trying to get 16 countries into Australia in the current world, where most countries are still going through COVID spiking, I think it’s unrealistic, or it’s going to be very, very difficult.”
Eddings said that Cricket Australia has put forward a number of options to the International Cricket Council (ICC). He further added, “The ICC are having meetings as we speak, it’s a bit of a movable feast at the moment.”
Nick Hockley, chief executive of the T20 World Cup, who took over as interim Cricket Australia leader on Tuesday, said that he expected the ICC to take a decision next month on the future of the tournament.
The most likely scenario seems to be rescheduling the tournament until next year but it will depend on the pandemic status and finding a spot in the crowded calendar of other cricket tournaments.
It was earlier speculated that T20 World Cup will be postponed to 2021 while the Indian Premier League (IPL) will be taking its slot. But neither of that has been confirmed by ICC or BCCI.
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