ICC confirmed eight of the twelve teams that will play in the Super12 stage of the T20 World Cup 2022 next year, following the 2016 T20I WC defending champions West Indies‘ defeat to Australia.
West Indies lost their final league game of the ICC T20 World Cup 2021 to Australia, meaning the defending champions’ campaign at this edition came to an end on Saturday. Following the same, automatic qualifiers for the Super 12 stage of the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup 2022 are now confirmed.
Out of the 12 automatic qualifiers for the 2022 edition of the tournament, eight of the twelve teams from this year will go through directly into the Super12 stage. As the T20 World Cup 2022 will be held in Australia, they are the first team to go through as the host nation. The remaining seven teams are England, India, Pakistan, New Zealand, South Africa, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh.
ICC Confirms Automatic Qualifiers For The 2022 T20I World Cup In Australia
The automatic qualifiers for the T20 World Cup 2022 are to be decided by the winner and the runners-up of the ongoing T20 World Cup, along with six teams that are ranked next highest on the ICC Men’s T20I rankings by November 15, which is the cut-off date for the same. Therefore, West Indies and Sri Lanka will need to play an additional qualifying round to enter the Super 12 stage of the next T20 World Cup in 2022.
“The automatic qualifiers for the Super 12 stage were determined to be the winner and runner-up of the current T20 World Cup, alongside the next six highest ranking teams on the ICC Men’s T20I rankings at the cut-off date of November 15,” the ICC stated.
“On Saturday, the teams that will fill those spots were confirmed courtesy of West Indies’ loss to Australia, which means they will sit 10th by the cut-off date, with Bangladesh climbing to eighth,” it further said.
England, Pakistan, India, New Zealand, South Africa, Australia are the current top six teams. However, before West Indies’ clash with Australia, these six teams confirmed that their rankings will not go down during the remainder of the 2021 T20 World Cup.
West Indies Slipped Down To 10th Spot In Rankings While Sri Lanka Is Just Above Them At Ninth
West Indies losing to Australia also ensured that Afghanistan, which is ranked seventh at the moment, will not drop below eighth, no matter what will be the outcome of their upcoming games in this edition. With this defeat, West Indies dropped down to the tenth spot, with Sri Lanka just above them at ninth. Bangladesh has risen to the eighth position, thus gaining the cut for the 2022 edition.
West Indies, therefore, will have to play the first round of the 2022 tournament to make it to the Super12s. They will be accompanied by Sri Lanka, Namibia, and Scotland in the same. West Indies managed to win just one match in the ongoing tournament, while Bangladesh lost all its games in the Super 12 stage.