The ICC Cricket World Cup 2023 is hardly less than three months away from the start. The fans are eagerly awaiting the blockbuster clash of Indo-Pak World Cup match. The tournament is scheduled to begin on 05th October when the defending champions England take on New Zealand in a repeat of their World Cup 2019 final.
Pakistan’s participation?
Pakistan’s participation in the tournament is still under review by a committee formed by the government, led by Bilawal Bhutto. They will decide whether the Babar-led side can participate in the tournament or not.
The standoff between PCB & BCCI began after the latter refused to tour Pakistan for the Asia Cup 2023. In return, the PCB management led by Rameez Raja & then Najam Sethi took a hard stance, that if India refused to tour Pakistan then they would also not travel to India for the ODI event.
Schedule Announcement
After a lot of delays & deliberation, BCCI finally released the highly anticipated tournament schedule on 27th June. The fixtures list for the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup 2023 in India has been released along with the 10 venues for the mega event that will span across 46 days later this year.
The first semi-final will be held on Wednesday, November 15 in Mumbai and the second semi-final will be held the following day in Kolkata. Both semi-finals will have a reserve day.
Here’s the complete original schedule: Men’s CWC 2023 Schedule Announced
The Final will take place at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad on November 19 with November 20 slated as the reserve day.
The mother of all rivalries, the Indo-Pak clash is set to take place in Narendra Modi Stadium, Ahmedabad on 15th October as per ICC’s official release.
BCCI confirms changes to schedule
In the latest developments the BCCI secretary Jay Shah, just confirmed that there will be changes made to the World Cup schedule after consultation with ICC in a few days.
He said that the different boards of countries have written citing logistical challenges their team would face. He did not name the teams.
“There is a possibility there could be few changes in the schedule” Shah said after a meeting in Delhi on Thursday. “Several Full Member countries have written in requesting to change two or three dates in the fixtures. We are working out with the ICC, and we should be able to clear it in two or three days.”
Shah said the venues of matches would remain the same in the revised schedule, but the gaps between games would be adjusted. “As far as possible, we are looking at not changing the venue as well as the matches. Not changing the venue is very important. Teams which have six-day gaps between matches, we are trying to reduce it to four-five days; and those that have just two-day gaps, we are trying to increase to three days.”
Indo-Pak World Cup clash
As per earlier reports, the BCCI was contemplating a change in the schedule of the match due to the Hindi festival Navratri also beginning on 15th October. The police had requested to change the date as they cannot provide full-proof security arrangements for such a high-octane encounter.
“Since October 15 coincides with the opening day of Navratri celebrations, the security agencies have advised that the big game, which will also need heavy deployment of security officials, should be rescheduled,” a BCCI source told.
The ICC will need to sit with the Indian board to decide on the date change if the need arises.
“Further discussion required and we’ll advise of any changes, when we can,” sources close to the ICC said.
Also read: Exploring Stark Similarities Between ICC Champions Trophy Final 2017 & ACC Emerging Cup Final 2023
The proposed date is 14th October but that day is already stipulated to have a double header & adjusting an India-Pakistan clash in between wouldn’t fit too well with the broadcasters as well.
Besides that Pakistani team is also scheduled to play Sri Lanka on 12th October in Hyderabad so it would be impossible for PCB to accept this proposal as this would give the green shirts hardly any preparation time for the match against their arch-rivals.
The logistics & booking are another nightmare to worry about as a lot of fans from all over the World are expected to reach Ahmedabad.
BCCI Meeting for World Cup Preparations
The BCCI has called the state associations hosting World Cup matches for a meeting in New Delhi on Friday to take a review of the preparations. Under discussion will also be the possible date change of the Indo-Pak game in the meeting.
“The meeting has been called to assess the preparations for the World Cup,” a State unit official told PTI.
On Wednesday, BCCI secretary Jay Shah wrote to the state associations on the formation of a Working Group.
The five office-bearers of the BCCI, including Shah and BCCI president Roger Binny, will oversee the preparations of all the venues, including the warm-up ones in Trivandrum and Guwahati.
Pakistan team just concluded their World Test Championship series against Sri Lanka by whitewashing them 0-2.
Meanwhile, India is on tour to the Windies where they won their WTC Test series by 0-1.
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