Women's ODI World Cup qualifier shifted from Sri Lanka to Zimbabwe; to begin in November
Written by I Dig Sports
Published in
Cricket
Thursday, 19 August 2021 02:32
The Women's ODI World Cup qualifier tournament, that will decide the final three spots for the 2022 World Cup, will be held in Zimbabwe later this year. The ICC has announced that the ten-team tournament will be played between November 21 and December 5 in Harare.
The qualifiers were originally meant to be hosted by Sri Lanka in July 2020, but the Covid-19 pandemic forced a postponement of the event, as well as the main World Cup event in New Zealand.
The ten teams vying for the three World Cup spots will be the five remaining teams with WODI status - Pakistan, West Indies, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Ireland - and the five regional qualifiers who won their respective competitions in 2019.
Hosts Zimbabwe are the Africa regional qualifiers, Thailand are from Asia, Papua New Guinea represent Asia East-Pacific, Netherlands are the European winners and United States of America will play as Americas champions.
While the top three make it to the eight-team ODI World Cup in March-April 2022, the next two teams from the competition will also secure their places in the upcoming ICC Women's Championship (IWC).
The next cycle of the ICC Women's Championship is expanding from eight teams to ten, thus leaving five free places. The other five spots are taken by the automatic qualifiers of the ODI World Cup - Australia, England, India, South Africa and New Zealand - on the back of their top-five finish in the previous iteration of the IWC.
"I wish to express our heartfelt thanks to the ICC board for their magnanimous gesture in allowing us the privilege of hosting the ICC Women's Cricket World Cup Qualifier 2021," Zimbabwe Cricket's Tavengwa Mukuhlani said after the announcement.
"On our part, we will leave no stone unturned to ensure this prestigious global event stands out as a unique event that celebrates Zimbabwe in all its magnificent splendour, richness, vibrancy, diversity and glory. I believe being granted the right to host this tournament is a vote of confidence in what we as ZC are doing and what we are hoping to do.
"You can rest assured we will not disappoint. We will not disappoint the nation of Zimbabwe and we will not disappoint the game of cricket."
Thailand Women
Ireland
Pakistan
Bangladesh
Papua New Guinea
Netherlands
United States of America
Zimbabwe
Sri Lanka
West Indies