The International Cricket Council (ICC) board meeting took place via virtual conference call and some major changes were announced with regards to Women’s cricket.
The inaugural edition of Women’s U19 World Cup, which was scheduled to take place in December 2021 in Bangladesh has been rescheduled for 2023, owing to COVID-19 pandemic. The postponement allows all cricket boards to plan their development of the U19 programmes, and also provide time for players to train and prepare appropriately.
The global qualifiers for 2022 Women’s World Cup, which was scheduled to take place around June/July in Sri Lanka, has been rescheduled for December 2021. Sri Lanka Women, along with Pakistan Women and West Indies Women from the ICC Women’s Championship, the two other teams with WODI status, Bangladesh Women and Ireland Women, and the winners of the five regional qualifiers – Thailand Women (Asia), Zimbabwe Women (Africa), Papua New Guinea Women (East Asia Pacific), United States of America Women (Americas) and Netherlands Women (Europe) will be competing for 3 spots in the Women’s World Cup Qualifiers.
It was also announced that all matches in the Women’s cricket medal category to be played during 2022 Commonwealth Games will carry official T20I ranking points. The Associate qualifier will get the opportunity to play with the top-ranked Women’s teams during the event in Birmingham.
The board has also announced that all the Women’s teams from full member countries will have permanent Test and ODI status, going forward. Ireland Women, who have played a solitary Women’s Test in 2000 against Pakistan Women, will hope to play their 2nd ever Test match sooner than later.
