One of the issues for many teams in the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup 2024, co-hosted by the West Indies and the United States of America (USA) will be the travelling. And the International Cricket Council (ICC) has got many reported displeasure on this problem in the early stages of the world event.
The West Indies will be playing all their games in the Caribbean during the group stage of the competition. Their first couple of games have been at the same ground at the Providence Stadium in Guyana. England are flying to only two venues for their first four games.
The defending champions will begin their T20 World Cup campaign against Scotland and the arch-rivals Australia at the Kensington Oval in Bridgetown, Barbados. After that, they will move to the Sir Vivian Richards Stadium in North Sound, Antigua, for the rest of the two games of the group against Oman and Namibia.
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India have been blessed with a very comfortable schedule, with no such travel. They played their one and only warm-up game of the T20 World Cup 2024 against Bangladesh at the Nassau County International Cricket Stadium.
On the same ground, they will begin their journey against Ireland on June 05, before taking on arch-rivals Pakistan on June 09, and following it up against the USA on June 12. After that, they will reach the Central Broward Regional Park Stadium Turf Ground in Lauderhill, Florida.
But several teams like Sri Lanka, South Africa and Ireland have been facing travelling issues during the course of the tournament. Ireland and Sri Lanka, after being involved in a practice game in Florida, faced trouble at the end of the game.
According to the news report, both these teams were made to wait for around seven hours without any updates from the ICC regarding to their flight to New York, whether they will play their respective opening fixture of the T20 World Cup 2024.
The delay meant the teams reached New York on Saturday morning, rather than their scheduled Friday evening. After playing under the sun, the players got exhausted, and then this travelling issue forced Sri Lanka to cancel their training session.
Even though the Indian team has got the luxury of staying in a hotel which is just beside the ground, the 2014-chanpions are asked to spend in a hotel which is around one and half hours away from the ground.
South Africa too will have the minimal travel, given their first three games will be played in New York, before they fly to Amos Vale Ground, in Kingstown, St Vincent.
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Sri Lanka on the other hand will play their four group games in alternative venues. They will begin their tournament against South Africa in New York, before moving at the Grand Prairie Stadium Dallas to play Bangladesh on June 08. Then they will move to Florida for the game against Nepal on June 12, before ending the group stage on 17th against Netherlands at the Darren Sammy National Stadium in Gros Islet, St Lucia.
In the first game of the competition, USA chased down a huge score of 197-runs against Canada with seven-wickets in hand. The second game of the T20 World Cup 2024 will be played on June 02, between West Indies and the Papua New Guinea (PNG) at the Providence Stadium in Guyana.