ISLAMABAD: India and Pakistan will play each other in a pop-up stadium on the outskirts of New York in the first group stage of next year’s T20 World Cup, with the full schedule due to be signed by the International Cricket Council and local organizing committees today, Friday, the UK’s Guardian newspaper reported.
England are defending champions having won the 2022 T20 World Cup in Australia, beating Pakistan in the final.
Ten teams will play all their opening group-stage games in the US, who are co-hosting the 2024 tournament with the West Indies, as organizers hope to tap in to America’s large, cricket-loving expat communities.
“India’s game against Pakistan in a pop-up stadium on the outskirts of New York will be the showpiece occasion of the first group stage of next year’s T20 World Cup,” the Guardian said in an exclusive story.
“Some changes to the schedule are still possible, but England and Australia will play all their group games in the Caribbean … It is understood that England’s games both in their initial, five-team group and, should they qualify from that, in the Super 8 round will all be in the British tourist hotspots of Antigua, Barbados and St. Lucia, but the Australians will visit some of the region’s other venues, in St. Vincent, Guyana and Trinidad.”
ICC inspectors have been visiting the Caribbean venues over the last fortnight, the Guardian said. The venue for the final has not been confirmed but it is likely to be in Barbados, which has previously hosted the finals of the 2007 50-over World Cup and the 2010 T20 event.
America has confirmed that they will use just three venues, Central Broward Park in Florida, Grand Prairie Stadium in Texas and Eisenhower Park on Long Island, about 25 miles from downtown Manhattan.
The first two are dedicated cricket grounds, while a temporary, 34,000-seat stadium will be constructed for the tournament in New York, which has some 711,000 Indian residents and about 100,000 people of Pakistani origin, according to latest census data.
There is a 10-and-a-half-hour time difference between New York and New Delhi and organizers have agreed to schedule some games, particularly those involving India, with morning starts to better serve Indian television audiences.
