How many teams are playing and what’s the format? When’s India vs Pakistan and where? Al Jazeera answers your questions.
Cricket’s biggest tournament is making its way to North America.
The United States and the West Indies are set to host 20 teams in the ICC Men’s Twenty20 World Cup 2024 from June 1 to 29.
Here’s what you need to know about the tournament:
The tournament has been expanded to include 20 teams for the first time, up from 16 teams in the 2022 edition.
The top eight teams from the previous edition and the two host nations, USA and West Indies, earned direct entry.
Afghanistan and Bangladesh qualified on the basis of their ICC T20 rankings on the cut-off date in November 2022.
The remaining six teams emerged from regional qualification tournaments that took place last year across the Americas, Africa, Asia, Asia Pacific and Europe.
USA, Papua New Guinea and Uganda will make their debut at an ICC World Cup.
Here is Al Jazeera’s list of all 20 squads.
The ICC has not confirmed the official line-up of the opening ceremony ahead of the first match between USA and Canada on June 1 at 7:30pm local time (00:30 GMT) in Dallas. However, there has been widespread promotion for a pre-match event on June 2, when co-hosts West Indies play Papua New Guinea in Guyana at 10:30am local time (14:30 GMT).
The tournament will be divided into two group-based rounds and a knockout round that will commence with the semifinals.
The 20 teams will be divided into four groups and following the round-robin matches, the top two teams from each group will advance to the Super Eight.
The four teams in each group will play against each other once in the Super Eight phase. The top two teams from each group will advance to the semifinals.
Al Jazeera has listed all the matches, with their timings and venues here.
Group stage: June 1 to 17
Super Eight: June 18 to 25
Semifinals: June 26 and 27
Final: June 29
Group A: India, Pakistan, Ireland, USA, Canada
Group B: Australia, England, Namibia, Scotland, Oman
Group C: Afghanistan, New Zealand, West Indies, Papua New Guinea, Uganda
Group D: Bangladesh, Nepal, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Netherlands
Group 1: A1, C1, B2, D2,
Group 2: B1, D1, A2, C2
Al Jazeera’s five favourites for the title are:
The tournament will be played at nine venues – three in the US and six across the West Indies.
New York, Texas and Florida will play host to the 16 matches being played in the US, with New York bagging half of those, including the marquee India vs Pakistan clash.
The six Caribbean nations that will host 39 matches are Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Grenada, Guyana, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, and Trinidad and Tobago.
Our stadium guide has everything you need to know about the venues.
India vs Pakistan is the biggest match of any ICC World Cup and one that is now a permanent fixture regardless of groups and seedings, which means every time the two nations participate in an ICC men’s event, they face each other at least once.
Whenever and wherever the South Asian rivals meet, tickets sell out in record time, hotels run at full occupancy and life in both countries comes to a standstill.
This time, the fixture has been assigned to New York, the bustling hub of the South Asian diaspora on the East Coast. It is scheduled for June 9 at 10:30am (14:30 GMT) at the purpose-built modular stadium in Nassau County, Long Island.
The state of New York has beefed up its security cover ahead of the big clash, with one police official saying it is the “largest security we’ve ever had to do”.
Tickets for the match were sold out within a few hours of going on sale, while resale platforms are asking for anything between $1,000 to $5,000 per seat.
There are a few of them. Here’s what they look like:
Here’s Al Jazeera’s quick walk through the history of the tournament.
The ICC has not confirmed the prize money for the 2024 edition of the tournament, but previous winners England walked away with $1.6m in 2022.
Tickets for the tournament went on sale in February via a public ballot, with prices beginning at $6 and going up to hundreds of dollars.
Tickets for some group matches and Super Eight matches are still available on the tournament website.
The ICC has allotted rights to various broadcasting and online streaming outlets across the world.
Al Jazeera will run extensive coverage of the tournament with pretournament news, previews, key information as well as live updates for the biggest matches, followed by post-match reaction, analysis and everything else you’d need to know about the T20 World Cup.
It’s a simple game of bat and ball, involving 11 players in each team but the rules can get a little complicated. Al Jazeera breaks it down for you here.
Now that you know everything about the sport, why not test yourself with our simple cricket quiz?
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