Namibia’s T20 Cricket Team will continue with their training programme following the postponement of the 2020 International Cricket Council (ICC) Men’s World Cup on Monday, which was scheduled for Australia.

The event was set to start on 18 October and end on 15 November, with Namibia having qualified for the tournament in October 2019, before the Covid -19 outbreak brought the world to a near standstill.

The tournament has now been rescheduled for October and November 2021, while the 2021 tournament has been moved to 2022 during the same months. Speaking to Nampa, Cricket Namibia (CN) chief executive officer Johan Muller said the team does not need to stop their preparations because of the postponement.

“Of course there will be financial consequences. There are still some things that are not clear at the moment because the decision was just made. We do not know how the qualification for the 2022 tournament will work,” he said.

ICC issued a statement on Monday saying the tournament has been postponed and the windows for the next three ICC men’s events had also been agreed to, to give the sport the best possible opportunity over the next three years to recover from the disruption caused by Covid-19.

“The decision gives us the best possible opportunity of delivering two safe and successful T20 World Cups,” ICC Chief Executive Manu Sawhney said in the statement. He further explained that this postponement will allow member associations to reschedule the lost bilateral and domestic cricket due to Covid-19.

The ICC board agreed to continue to monitor the rapidly changing situation and assess all the information available in order to make a considered decision on future hosts to ensure the sport is able to stage safe and successful global events in 2021 and 2022, the statement continued.

The national men’s cricket team made history when they qualified for the T20 World Cup 2020 by beating Oman in their final playoff match by 54 runs in a qualification tournament held in Dubai in October 2019. – Nampa