Live - ICC to replace Bangladesh at World Cup if they don't travel to India

Overview

Follow ESPNcricinfo's coverage of the ICC boarding meeting on Wednesday
BCB firm on stance that Bangladesh won't play T20 World Cup matches in India
PCB also wrote to the ICC supporting Bangladesh's stance

54m ago

ICC board votes to replace Bangladesh if they don't travel to India

It is understood the ICC has told the BCB to inform the Bangladesh government that if Bangladesh continues to refuse to travel to India to play its matches in the 2026 T20 World Cup, then they will be replaced by another team at the tournament. That decision was followed by a vote, where the majority of the ICC Board was in favour of having a replacement.

BCB have been given one more day to come back to the ICC on its stance on playing in India.

If that is the case, then Scotland is likely to replace Bangladesh in Group C at the World Cup. Scotland had failed to qualify for the 2026 T20 World Cup, having finished behind Netherlands, Italy and Jersey at the European Qualifier.

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2h ago

ICC board meeting begins

The ICC board meeting to take a decision on the impasse with the BCB over Bangladesh's refusal to play their 2026 T20 World Cup matches has begun.

The meeting is being attended by the directors of all Full Member countries. It is understood that, apart from the ICC chair Jay Shah, those participating in the meeting include BCB president Aminul Islam, BCCI secretary Devajit Saikia, SLC president Shammi Silva, PCB chairman Mohsin Naqvi, CA chairman Mike Baird, Zimbabwe Cricket president Tavenga Mukuhlani, CWI president Kishore Shallow, Cricket Ireland chair Brian MacNeice, Cricket New Zealand representative Roger Twose, ECB chair Richard Thompson, Cricket South Arica representative Mohammed Moosajee and Mirwais Ashraf, Cricket Afghanistan chairman.

Also attending the meeting is top brass of ICC management including Sanjog Gupta (CEO), ICC’s deputy chairman Imran Khawaja and Gaurav Saxena (General Manager, Events), and two Associate Member directors Mubashshir Usmani and Mahinda Vallipuram.

ICC’s anti-corruption head Andrew Ephgrave is also participating in the meeting. Ephgrave was in Dhaka last week to have in-person meetings with BCB to assuage the security concerns the latter has repeatedly expressed on Bangladesh travelling to India.

Overnight on Wednesday, news emerged that the PCB had written to the ICC supporting Bangladesh’s stance on not playing in India.

Here are some possible scenarios about how this impasse could end.

Is there a security threat for travelling teams in in India? A risk assessment report for the T20 World Cup, compiled by an independent security agency, and accessed by ESPNcricinfo, says the threat to teams playing in India is in the moderate-high band, but there is "no information to indicate a direct threat against participating teams."

Bangladesh are in Group C at the T20 World Cup and scheduled to play their first three games in Kolkata on February 7, 9 and 14 and the final one in Mumbai on February 17.

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