There is an added incentive for teams competing in the ongoing World Cup to finish inside the top seven on the league table – qualification for the eight-team ICC Champions Trophy 2025 alongside designated host Pakistan.
The ICC had revived the Champions Trophy in 2021 for the international calendar of 2024-2031 and the two editions of the tournament will be staged in 2025 and 2029.
The Champions Trophy is also set to follow the traditional format – four teams divided into two groups with top two sides from each group entering the semifinals to be followed by the final.
And even as the tournament is still two years off, there is already talk doing the rounds that world cricket’s “Big Daddy” India (read BCCI) will throw its economic muscle behind ensuring that the tournament will be played on the template it enfoorced at the recently concluded Asia Cup. Wherein host nation only in name Pakistan got to stage only a few inconsequential games of the tournament. The bulk of the Asia Cup games were played in BCCI’s designated host country venue – Sri Lanka.
“World governing body” ICC can be expected to genefluct before the financial might of the BCCI. The same would be expected of the other cricketing boards as well.
If the league phase of the ongoing ICC World Cup ends as it currently stands, India, South Africa, New Zealand, Australia, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan and The Netherlands will be the nations qualifying for the Champions Trophy alongside hosts Pakistan.
Notable absentees – Bangladesh and league table wooden spooners England.
