Qatar Cricket Association (QCA) have been awarded the hosting rights for the Western region Asia Qualifiers for 2022 ICC Men’s T20 World Cup from October 23rd – 29th, 2021. Earlier, Kuwait Cricket (KC) was awarded the hosting rights for the Western Asian region qualification pathway tournament. Qatar will compete against Bahrain, Maldives, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, from which the top team will progress into the one of the two eight-team global qualifiers.
With Nepal, Singapore, United Arab Emirates, Zimbabwe, Hong Kong (Asia sub-regional group B qualifier as the tournament scheduled to take place in November 2021 in Malaysia was cancelled and Hong Kong qualify based on their Team T20I ranking on the cut-off date), Jersey and The Philippines already confirmed entrants into the global qualifiers, one more country from the Asian region will get the opportunity to take part in the event and have the chance to compete for the four spots (two spots each from global qualifier A & B) into the main draw of 2022 ICC T20 World Cup in Australia in October/November.
The countries in the region have played against each other on a yearly basis in 2018 and 2019 in the Asian Cricket Council (ACC) Western Region T20 tournament. The 2019 event was the qualification pathway towards Asia Cup qualifiers, while the 2018 event was a standalone regional event, in which Saudi Arabia were crowned champions, after their win against Qatar in the final. Both the events were hosted by Oman Cricket (OC), who will now be hosting the first round of group A fixtures in the 2021 ICC Men’s T20 World Cup in October.
ICC Men’s T20 World Cup Asia Regional Qualifiers A Schedule
23rd October 2021: Qatar vs Bahrain (Scorecard) ; Maldives vs Saudi Arabia (Scorecard)
24th October 2021: Bahrain vs Kuwait (Scorecard) ; Qatar vs Maldives (Scorecard)
25th October 2021: Kuwait vs Saudi Arabia (Scorecard)
27th October 2021: Bahrain vs Maldives (Scorecard) ; Saudi Arabia vs Qatar (Scorecard)
28th October 2021: Maldives vs Kuwait (Scorecard) ; Bahrain vs Saudi Arabia (Scorecard)
29th October 2021: Kuwait vs Qatar (Scorecard)
Squads
Bahrain: Abdul Majid Malik, Ammad Uddin, Anasim Khan, Fiaz Ahmed, Haider Ali Butt, Imran Javed, Imran Ali Butt, Junaid Aziz, Mohammed Younis, Rsashanth Kurup, Sarfraz Ali, Shahid Mehmood, Waseeq Ahmed and Veerapathiran Sathaiyah
Kuwait: Adnad Idrees, Bilal, Edson Daisy Silva, Meet Bhavsar, Mohamed Aslam, Mohammad Kashif, Morshed, Naveed Fakhr, Nawaf Ahmed, Pradeep Wasantha Kirihathanalage, Ravija Sandaruwan, Sayed Monib, Shiraz Khan and Usmangani Ibrahim
Qatar: Andri Berenger, Dharmang Patel, Gayan Buddika, Imal Liyanage, Iqbal Hussain, Kamran Khan, Mohammed Nadeem, Muhammad Ikramullah, Muhammad Murad, Muhammad Tanveer, Musawar Shah, Rizlan Iqbar, Sandun Vithanage and Zaheeruddeen Ibrahim
Maldives: Mohamed Mahafooz, Yoosuf Azyan Farhath, Hassan Ibrahim, Mohamed Rishwan, Ahmed Hassan, Hassan Haziq Rasheed, Ibrahim Nashath, Leem Shafeeq, Mohamed Azzam, Ameel Mauroof, Ibrahim Rizan, Mohamed Ivan, Adam Nasif and Malinda Wedage
Saudi Arabia: Abdul Ghaffar, Imran Arif, Zeeshan Sarfaraz Butt, Faisal Khan, Ahmed Abdul Waheed Baladarf, Imran Yousuf, Amir Shahzad, Muhammad Nadeem, Ishtiaq Ahmad, Zain ul Abdin, Abdul Wahid, Basit Ali, Mohammad Hisham Shaikh and Sajid Imran Cheema
