The International Cricket Council (ICC) on Wednesday rejected Bangladesh's demand to shift all their T20 World Cup 2026 matches out of India. The decision came after an ICC board meeting in which all directors of the full member nations, including Bangladesh, participated, thus officially ending the month-long deadlock between the Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) and ICC.
After Mustafizur Rahman's unceremonious removal from the Indian Premier League (IPL), the BCB had written to ICC, requesting the apex body to shift all their T20 World Cup 2026 matches to Sri Lanka. Although ICC had a couple of meetings with the BCB on the matter, the Bangladesh board remained firm in its stance against travelling to India.
“The decision was reached after considering all security assessments conducted, including independent reviews, all of which indicated there was no threat to Bangladesh players, media persons, officials and fans at any tournament venues in the country,” ICC said in its statement.
“It was noted that it was not feasible to make changes so close to the tournament and that altering the schedule under the circumstances, in the absence of any credible security threat, could set a precedent that would jeopardise the sanctity of future ICC events and undermine its neutrality as a global governing body,” the statement further added.
Bangladesh have been put in Group C of the T20 World Cup 2026 along with Nepal, Italy, West Indies and England. Bangladesh are scheduled to play against Italy, the West Indies and England at Kolkata's iconic Eden Gardens while they play Nepal at Mumbai's Wankhede Stadium.
BCB yet to announce its decision
Meanwhile, the BCB is yet to officially issue a statement on the matter. Earlier, according to an ESPNcricinfo report, the Bangladesh board has been given a day's time to finalise its decision on whether to play their T20 World Cup 2026 matches in India.
In case the BCB remains firm on its stance of not playing in India, then the ICC will replace Bangladesh with Scotland in Group C. Scotland had finished fourth during the European Qualifiers behind the Netherlands, Italy and Jersey. The Netherlands and Italy eventually qualified.
However, Jersey won't be considered for participation due to their lower ICC T20I rankings as compared to Scotland. Jersey are ranked 27 while Scotland are way above at 14. In fact, Scotland are the highest-ranked team among all the teams in the T20 World Cup 2026 Qualifiers.
