The Women’s World Cup Qualifiers, which were being played in Zimbabwe have been called off due to the new COVID-19 variant named Omicron that has recently caused panic in the southern parts of Africa.
It was an eight-team event, and 12 games had been played so far. With the 2022 World Cup only three months away, the tournament cannot be staged at a later date and hence, it cannot be postponed or moved to another venue.
Now that the Qualifiers have been called off, the teams that will progress to the Women’s World Cup, which will be played in March-April next year in New Zealand have been decided based on the ICC rankings. The rankings were decided based on a cut-off date which was September 30. That means West Indies, Pakistan and Bangladesh have qualified and will be a part of the mega event in early 2022.
“We are incredibly disappointed to have to cancel the remainder of this event but with travel restrictions from a number of African countries being imposed at such short notice, there was a serious risk that teams would be unable to return home.
We have explored a number of options to allow us to complete the event but it isn’t feasible and we will fly the teams out of Zimbabwe as soon as possible.
Bangladesh, Pakistan and the West Indies will now qualify for the ICC Women’s World Cup 2022 by virtue of their rankings, whilst Sri Lanka and Ireland will also join them in the next cycle of the ICC Women’s Championship,”
the ICC head of events Chris Tetley was quoted saying.
The news has come as a massive disappointment to some of the other teams, especially for the Thailand side, who seemed to be on a roll. They won three and lost just one game in their group stage and were super impressive. They had even beaten hosts Zimbabwe and a strong Bangladesh team.
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