THE International Cricket Council’s (ICC) carried out an inspection of the Guyana National Stadium, Providence, one of the venues earmarked to host matches during the 2018 Women’s T/20 World Cup, which will be hosted by Cricket West Indies (CWI).

The event will bowls off November 3-24 next year, will see a return to the Caribbean for the second time, with the first being in 2010. The West Indies are current holders of the title.

ICC Media and Communication Manager, Sami Ul Hassan, explained that the officials are inspecting a total of 11 venues from the eight countries and will focus on the playing surface, broadcast, spectator and operational perspectives.

Upon completion of the inspections, the ICC team of inspectors will submit their reports to CWI who will make the final decision on which venues will be used for the 2018 tournament.

“The tournament is going to be extremely important to us (ICC) coming off the very successful 2017 50-over World Cup and the 2016 Women’s T/20 World Cup that saw packed stands,” Hassan said.

Ruchika Rana, Broadcast Production Manager of the ICC, told reporters, that all systems seems to be in place at the Providence facility to accommodate production of the magnitude required for the T20 World Cup, adding that next year’s event will be produced in Hi-definition (HD) and may see the inclusion of the umpire decision review system (DRS) along with spider-cameras.

The ICC Women’s World T20 is the bi-annual international championship for International Cricket. The event is organised by the sport’s governing body, the International Cricket Council (ICC), with the first edition being held in England in 2009.

For the first three tournaments, there were eight participants, but this number has been raised to 10 from the 2014 edition onwards.

At each tournament, a set number of teams qualify automatically, with the remaining teams determined by the World Twenty20 Qualifier.

Australia are the most successful team at the World Twenty20, having won three tournaments, while the most recent tournament in 2016 was won by the West Indies.

Qualification is determined by the ICC Women’s Twenty20 international rankings and a qualification event, the Women’s World T20 Qualifier.

Until 2014, six teams were determined by the top six teams of the ICC Women’s T20 International rankings at the time of the draw and the remaining two places determined by a qualification process.
For the 2014 tournament, six places are determined by the top eight teams of the ICC Women’s T20I rankings, with the host country and three qualifiers joining them in the finals.