By Kevin Mapasure Zimbabwe Cricket (ZC) will enter a joint bid to host the 2027 International Cricket Council (ICC) World Cup together with neighbours South Africa. The country partly hosted the global showcase in 2003 and after successfully hosting the 2018 World Cup qualifiers and having already been given the rights to stage the same qualifiers […]
By Kevin Mapasure
Zimbabwe Cricket (ZC) will enter a joint bid to host the 2027 International Cricket Council (ICC) World Cup together with neighbours South Africa.
The country partly hosted the global showcase in 2003 and after successfully hosting the 2018 World Cup qualifiers and having already been given the rights to stage the same qualifiers for the next edition next year, the cricket body wants to try and clinch the finals.
Interest has already been registered with the ICC and the bid is being prepared.
Apart from that, Zimbabwe is looking to host the women’s World Cup qualifiers in December.
The qualifiers were supposed to be staged in Sri Lanka but due to Covid 19 they are going to be taken away from the Asian country.
Zimbabwe qualified to the main qualifiers after winning a regional tournament that they hosted.
ZC general manager Givemore Makoni confirmed to NewsDay Sport that ZC had registered interest in hosting two World Cup qualifiers as well as one final.
Zimbabwe is one of several nations that have registered interest in staging ICC events between this year and 2031.
“Everything is still at initial stages we have not done much except that we have discussed and agreed with South Africa for a joint bid for the 2027 World Cup,” Makoni said.
“We have registered interest with the ICC but nothing much has been done even the bid itself has not yet been prepared. What I can say now is that we want to host the women’s World Cup qualifiers in December because they are being taken away from Sri Lanka. We also reaffirmed our commitment to hosting next year’s World Cup qualifiers on the men’s side. We were awarded the hosting rights but everything is in limbo at the moment because of Covid 19. You can lose the rights if your country is badly affected by the pandemic. But I must say the situation here is not bad our numbers are still quite low.”
While the Covid 19 numbers have been relatively low compared with other countries the government has not been hesitant to ban sport whenever there is a spike in cases.
Currently all sporting activities are banned and there have been a few exceptions.
ZC has been allowed to host Bangladesh for their Test match starting on Wednesday as well as six matches in white ball cricket afterwards.
The 2018 World Cup qualifiers attracted large crowds, which might have encouraged the ICC to give Zimbabwe the rights to host next year’s tournament.
But with fans totally banned from attending sporting activities, ZC have been left sweating over whether they can be allowed to staged ICC events under such conditions.
The hosting of the 2003 World Cup helped the country uplift its facilities and if Zimbabwe were to win the 2027 rights, they will benefit from ICC funds to spruce up their stadia.
