T20 World Cup to be played in UAE: BCCI’s Jay Shah

NEW DELHI: The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) on Monday said that it is shifting the ICC T20 World Cup from India to United Arab Emirates (UAE). BCCI secretary Jay Shah told news agency ANI that the board will inform International Cricket Council (ICC) about the decision.

“We will inform the International Cricket Council today that we are shifting T20 World Cup to UAE. Dates will be decided by the ICC,” Shah told ANI.

The decision has been taken in view of evolving coronavirus situation in India. BCCI vice-president Rajeev Shukla told ANI that today was the deadline when the board was supposed to inform the ICC about the decision. The BCCI office-bearers connected over a conference call to take stock of the covid situation and arrived at the decision to shift the tournament to UAE.

“Nobody is really sure what is going to happen after two to three months. Keeping all things in mind, a decision has been taken that BCCI will inform ICC to move it to UAE because that's ideal venue after India. We wanted to host it in India,” Shukla told ANI.

Shukla added that the tournament dates are going to be the same and it will take place immediately after IPL gets over.

“Qualifiers may take place in Oman and the rest of the matches will be on three grounds - Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Sharjah,” Shukla informed.

The 2021 men’s T20 World Cup is expected to start from 17 October, with the final for the 16-team tournament scheduled for 14 November. The IPL final is likely to be held on 15 October with the remainder of IPL 2021 being played in the UAE, starting 19 September.

On 1 June, ICC granted BCCI until the end of June to give its final word on whether India will be able to host the T20 World Cup. In view of evolving covid situation, ICC postponed the 2020 World Cup, originally scheduled to be held in Australia, and decided India would host the tournament in 2021 with Australia hosting the 2022 edition.

However, the second wave of covid-19 has severely impacted these plans forcing BCCI to abruptly suspend the IPL at the halfway stage in May.