The United States of America will co-host the 2024 International Cricket Council Men’s T20 World Cup along with the West Indies. Yes, you read it right: the premier ‘gentleman’s game’ is coming Stateside. This is the first International Cricket Council (ICC) World Cup that will take place from 1-29 June 2024. Although not as popular as basketball and baseball in the United States of America, cricket is the second-most widely played sport in the world after soccer.
There is tremendous excitement among the 6,000 cricket teams and the 250,000 persons who currently play and watch the game of cricket in the USA. It is the hope of the organizers that the T20 tournament will boost the popularity of cricket in schools, colleges, and universities across the fifty states of America.
Cricket is called the ‘gentleman’s game’ because it was first played by the aristocratic classes in England in the mid-15th century. However, cricket is no stranger to America; it was played in the United States of America as early as 1709. There are historical records to show that the slave owner William Byrd II played cricket on his plantation in Westover, Virginia, and several of the cricket players were enslaved persons. Cricket was widely played across the British American colonies, especially in the Eastern seaboard states prior to the Civil War.
It is incredible to think that the first international cricket game was played between the USA and Canada in Manhattan, New York, on the grounds of St. George’s Cricket Club in 1844. The St. George’s Cricket Club, which still exists today, got its name from the St. George’s Episcopal Church, Stuyvesant Square, Manhattan, New York.
In the United States of America, the governing body for the sport of cricket is *USA Cricket. As the national federation for cricket in the United States, it is recognized by the International Cricket Council as an associate member.
The T20 World Cup cricket tournament consists of 20 international teams. They will represent the top twenty (20) qualifying teams and will be divided into four groups of five.
The top two teams from each group will advance from the group stage to the Super 8 stage. In the Super 8 stage, the qualifying teams will then be split into two groups of four; the top two teams from each group will play to qualify for the third knockout stage, which will consist of two semi-finals and a final.
Four (4) of these cricket games, or matches as they are also called, will be played in Florida, four (4) will be played in the state of Texas, and eight (8) in the state of New York.
All the other cricket games will be played in the West Indian nations of Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Guyana, St. Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, and Trinidad and Tobago. Avid cricket fans and curious onlookers can get all the latest cricket news from ESPN.
Rev. Ronald A. Nathan is the world politics editor for the Star of Zion and senior pastor at the Hoggard A.M.E. Zion Church, St Michael, Barbados.
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