“Všechny silnice vedou do Prahy” in 6-nation Central Europe T20I Cup in Sep 2020

Czech Republic Cricket Board will be hosting the seventh edition of Central Europe Cup at Prague from Sep 24th – 27th, 2020 as Czech Cricket will play host’s to men’s national squads from Belgium, Luxembourg, Hungary, Malta and Austria. All the thirteen matches including the knock-out stage games will be carrying ICC’s “T20I” status and ranking points towards ICC T20I team rankings and will be the first official T20I matches to be played in the Czech Republic.

All the teams will be divided into two groups of three teams each and will be playing against their group opponents in a single round-robin group stage format, before their group standings will decide the matches in the knock-out stages of the tournament. Group A will contain Austria, Belgium and Hungary, while Group B will include Czech Republic, Luxembourg and Malta. Belgium have broken into the top 50 in the rankings on the account of their successful campaign during the Luxembourg T20I Tri-series held during the final week of Aug 2020, where they remained unbeaten in the tournament and registered two T20I wins each against the host’s and Czech Republic.

All the matches will be played at Scott Page Field and Banks Field grounds in Prague. “Všechny silnice vedou do Prahy”, indeed. Coming into the tournament, Austria are the highest placed team in the rankings at 38th position, followed by Belgium at 47th, Hungary at 53rd, Czech Republic at 61st, Luxembourg at 63rd and Malta at 78th.

The Central Europe Cup was held for the first time in 2014 and was played in the traditional 50-overs format until 2018, before the format was changed to T20 from the 2019 edition of the tournament, keeping in mind the preparations towards Europe sub-regional qualifiers for T20 World Cup. Over the years, 10 countries have participated in the tournament, with Switzerland having made the most appearances and taking part in every edition except 2015 and the 2020 edition (Switzerland are currently a non-Associate member). The tournament will mark Belgium and Austria first-ever appearance in the competition.