Picture Credit: ICC
Ahead of this year's T20 World Cup, there are a lot of uncertainties around the mega event due the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic across the globe. With only around four months left for the tournament to begin, it seems like ICC have finally laid out a probable plan which would be put in action to conduct the event.
2021 T20 World Cup likely to begin from October 17
As per reports, the mega-event is set to commence from October 17 with the grand finale set to be played on November 14. In the first round of the T20 World Cup, eight qualifying teams featuring Sri Lanka, Ireland, Papua New Guinea, Oman, Bangladesh, Namibia, Netherlands and Scotland - are set to fight it out for the final four spots in the next round. The qualifiers could go on for one week post which the Super 12 stage is slated to begin where the four new teams will join the likes of India, Australia, England, South Africa, Pakistan, New Zealand, West Indies and Afghanistan.
Qualifiers likely to be played in Oman
With IPL 2021 set to end on October 15, ICC is reportedly planning to shift the first round of 2021 T20 World Cup to Oman to get the venues in UAE (Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Sharjah) ready for the main stage of the event. While BCCI will remain the hosts of the tournament, it is very unlikely that they will be available to conduct it in India seeing the present scenario. However, the board has been given a deadline until June 28 to decide on the same.