ICC T20 Cricket World Cup 2020 will take place in Australia from 18 October 2020 to 15 November 2020. There will be six new teams taking part in this T20 Cricket World Cup. The path to the qualification for these six teams was not easy and definitely was not short. But still, with sheer consistency, hard work, and team spirit, these six teams made their nations proud by qualifying for the very exciting ICC T20 World Cup 2020. In this article, we will see the 2019 ICC T20 World Cup Qualifier tournament format, the tournament winners and the 6 teams which managed to qualify for the T20 World Cup 2020. We will also see the ICC T20 World Cup Super 8 and Super 12 round structure and team groups.
ICC T20 World Cup Qualifier Format
Before we see the ICC T20 World Cup Qualifier Tournament winner and the 6 teams who managed to qualify, let us first understand how was the format of the qualifier tournament and how difficult was the journey of the qualification.
Total 61 teams (actually 62 teams, but Zambia withdrew participation later) participated in the race for the final 6 qualifying spots for the T20 World Cup 2020 to be played in Australia.
Top 10 teams in the ICC T20 rankings have directly qualified for the T20 World Cup. And these top 6 teams from the Qualifier tournament will join them in the T20 World Cup.
Thus a total of 16 teams will play in the T20 World Cup 2020 in Australia. Details of the teams given later in the article.
T20 World Cup Qualifier Journey
The 61 teams competed in 12 regional qualification groups – Africa (3 groups), Americas (2), Asia (2), East Asia Pacific (2) and Europe (3). These teams played these regional matches in 2018.
Top 25 teams from these regional qualifier 2018 matches then competed in the regional finals 2019. There they aimed to get a place in the final 14 in the T20 World Cup Qualifier tournament, scheduled in Oct-Nov, 2019. Since UAE was selected as the host for the Qualifier tournament, they need not play in the regional finals and had got direct entry into the Qualifier tournament.
The top 7 teams from these regional finals 2019, the T20 World Cup Qualifier host, United Arab Emirates, and the top 6 teams from the 2015 T20 World Cup qualifier (excluding teams, if any, in the top 10 teams in ICC T20 rankings as on 31st December 2018), competed in the ICC T20 World Cup Qualifier tournament.
Thus in all, 14 teams played in the Qualifier tournament, for the final 6 spots in the T20 World Cup 2020 next year.
Nigeria replaced Zimbabwe in the Qualifier Tournament
As you may be knowing, the Zimbabwe team was suspended by ICC in July 2019 and so was not allowed to play in any ICC cricket tournaments.
Nigeria were second in the Africa regional qualifiers standings. Thus Nigeria replaced Zimbabwe in the 2019 ICC T20 World Cup Qualifier tournament.
But Nigeria could not make use of this opportunity, as they lost all of their six matches in the Qualifier tournament and thus were last on the final standings list.
ICC T20 World Cup Qualifier Tournament Winners
The 2019 T20 World Cup Qualifier took place from 18 October to 2 November 2019 in the United Arab Emirates.
The final was played on November 2, 2019, at Dubai International Cricket Stadium, Dubai between Papua New Guinea and the Netherlands.
The Netherlands won the T20 World Cup qualifier final by beating Papua New Guinea by 7 wickets.
6 Teams to Qualify for T20 World Cup 2020
Let us see the standings of all the teams in the qualifier tournament:
Final Standings after the T20 Qualifier Tournament
[table id=147 /]
Thus the top six teams to qualify for the T20 World Cup 2020 are:
- Netherlands
- Papua New Guinea
- Ireland
- Namibia
- Scotland
- Oman
UAE was the tournament host. Still didn’t qualify?
UAE was selected as the host of the tournament. Thus they did not need to play the regional qualifier finals. As they were the host for the qualifier tournament, they directly got an entry into the Qualifier tournament. Thus they secured a spot only in the final 14 and not in the final 6.
They had to compete with the other 13 teams in this Qualifier tournament, in order to qualify for the final 6 spots. Unfortunately, they came 7th in the tournament and thus failed to qualify.
Papua New Guinea and Namibia in their first T20 World Cup
Papua New Guinea (PNG) is an interesting little country next to Indonesia. It is mostly surrounded by water on other sides. It is mentioned as part of Oceania, the region that includes most Pacific islands, New Zealand and Australia. So it can be associated with both continents, Asia and Australia.
PNG is an extremely diverse country, known to have around 851 languages spoken in the country. 82 percent of the population lives in rural areas.
The T20 World Cup qualification is certainly a great thing for this country. It is one of the least explored countries culturally and geographically. Hopefully, after the T20 World Cup, the world will get to know this country in a better way.
Namibia is an African country to the top left of South Africa. It is located between the Namib and the Kalahari deserts and has very low rainfall.
Football is the most popular sport there. However, they have not been able to qualify for the Football World Cup so far.
So this T20 World Cup entry is a big thing for the country as a whole.
Actually, they had once participated in the ODI Cricket World Cup in 2003 hosted by their neighbor, South Africa.
The Netherlands return to T20 World Cup for the 4th time
The Netherlands have participated four times in the ODI World Cup so far (1996, 2003, 2007, and 2011).
And they have played the T20 World Cup total 3 times (2009, 2014, and 2016) in the past.
Scotland also qualifies for T20 World Cup for the 4th time
Scotland have played the ODI World Cup three times (1999, 2007, 2015) in the past.
And they have also played T20 World Cup three times (2007, 2009, and 2016) so far.
Ireland will play their 6th T20 World Cup
Ireland have played three ODI World Cups (2007, 2011, and 2015) in the past.
And so far they have the experience of playing in five T20 World Cups (2009, 2010, 2012, 2014, and 2016).
Second T20 World Cup for Oman
Though Oman have not played any ODI World Cup, they were part of the T20 World Cup in 2016.
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T20 World Cup 2020 ‘Super 8’ and ‘Super 12’ Rounds
There will be two main rounds in the T20 World Cup 2020. First will be the ‘Super 8’ and the second will be the ‘Super 12’.
Super 8 round teams
Top six qualifying teams from the 2019 T20 World Cup Qualifier tournament and Sri Lanka and Bangladesh will compete in the ‘Super 8’ round.
Sri Lanka and Bangladesh had failed to get direct entry into the ‘Super 12’ round as they were not in the top eight teams in the ICC T20 rankings list, at the time of the qualification decision. So now they have to fight in the ‘Super 8’ round to earn an entry into the ‘Super 12’ round.
Super 12 round teams
Top 4 teams from the ‘Super 8’ round will then advance to play in the ‘Super 12’ round.
These four teams from ‘Super 8’ will join the following top-ranked teams in the ‘Super 12’: Pakistan, India, Australia, England, New Zealand, South Africa, West Indies, and Afghanistan.
The below image gives a good understanding of the T20 World Cup 2020 ‘Super 8’ and ‘Super 12’ round structure and the team groups:
Alright, so that was some quick information about the ICC T20 World Cup Qualifier tournament and its format, the tournament winners, and the 6 teams which managed to qualify for the ICC T20 World Cup 2020.
And finally, we saw the ICC T20 World Cup Super 8 and Super 12 round structure and the team groups.
Now that you know the teams playing in the ‘Super 8’, can you predict which four teams from the ‘Super 8’ will enter the ‘Super 12’?
Also, tell which two teams can make it to the World Cup final. Leave your answers in the comment section below.
Sources:
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