International Cricket Council (ICC) have confirmed that the Americas Qualifiers to the ICC U19 Men’s Cricket World Cup have been cancelled due to COVID-19. Earlier, USA Cricket were awarded the hosting rights for the Americas region qualification pathway tournament in September towards 2022 ICC U19 Cricket World Cup in West Indies.
Canada U19 have been given the opportunity to take part in the 2022 edition, based on securing the most wins in the last five U19 qualifying events in the Americas region. Canada had won the previous qualifiers held in King City in Toronto in 2019 and took part in the 2020 edition of the U19 World Cup.
ICC Head of Events, Chris Tetley said: “It is incredibly disappointing that the regional qualifiers to the ICC U19 Men’s Cricket World Cup have been cancelled due to COVID-19. Under the Member approved guidelines, where teams have withdrawn due to the impact caused by the pandemic, we had no other alternative but to cancel these events. We have worked closely with all Members to try to ensure results can be determined on the field of play, however for these events it was not possible.”
USA were scheduled to host U19 teams from Canada, Bermuda and Argentina in the 4-nation qualifiers to determine the Americas region Associate representative in the World Cup. USA had in fact also named their U19 squad in the month of July 2021 for the event, so the cancellation will be a big disappointment for the squad members, who had been chosen based on performances in the U19 National Championships held prior to the squad selection.
