The start of this year may have been tough for the sports industry as many sports leagues were forced to cancel or postpone their seasons in March.
Many sports like football, basketball, baseball, and also cricket were all affected by the pandemic.
However, since June, many sports leagues have already announced their returns like the EPL and the NBA. For cricket fans, you’ll also be glad to know that there are still many cricket matches that are in store for you this year. If you’re always looking forward to watching and wagering on cricket matches, this may still be a great year for this.
Wagering on the upcoming cricket matches should still be easy even if it is likely that all of them will happen behind closed doors. You can always just check the 10CRIC Cricket site and other bookmakers to place your bets online. Here are some of the biggest cricket events that you can still look forward to this year.
Dream 2020 Indian Premier League
The previous seasons of the Indian Premier League (IPL) usually start from March to May. However, the IPL was forced to postpone its opening March to ensure everyone’s safety from the virus. The return of the IPL this year was only announced in August.
Like many sports events that are still pushed through this year, the IPL will also be different. The matches will be held behind closed doors and it will be hosted in the UAE. The opening of the IPL will be on September 19 with a match between Chennai Super Kings and Mumbai Indians. The ten doubleheaders of the season will start on October 10 and the season will conclude on November 10.
Another change for this season is the time of the start of the matches. The previous IPL matches would start at 8:00 PM Indian time, however, the matches this season will start 3 minutes earlier, at 7:30 PM or 8:00 PM UAE time. The doubleheaders will then start at 3:30 IST or 4:00 UAE time.
ICC World Test Championship
The ICC World Test Championship, which is a partial round-robin league has started in August 2019 and it will be played for over two years. However, in March, this was suspended. The second Test match between Pakistan and Bangladesh was postponed that time and eventually, the rest of the season was put on hold.
There is still a possibility that the rest of the season will come back before the year ends since the IPL is already scheduled to come back. So far, the ICC announced that the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup is postponed for a year. The rest of the ICC World Test Championship hasn’t been completely canceled yet. The rest of the Test series are still being worked on. The ICC is no prioritizing on rescheduling this and it will take place in England.
This season features a total of 13 teams with 12 of them as the Full Members of the ICC. The other country is the Netherlands that won the 2015-2017 ICC World Cricket League Championship. Each team in this league will be playing an ODI series against eight of the twelve opponents.
Each of the series will have three ODIs. There will be four series at home and four away. This also means that some teams won’t be facing all other opponents. However, all of the teams involved will be playing with the same number of matches.
World Cup Super League
The start of the World Cup Super League was also affected by the pandemic as several matches were postponed. Initially, the matches between Bangladesh and Ireland were the only ones postponed in March. However, April came and South Africa’s tour to Sri Lanka was also postponed. The same goes for Pakistan’s and West Indies’ tour of the Netherlands.
It was in May that Cricket Ireland also postponed New Zealand’s tour. Many more tours were canceled since then, but on July 27, the ICC launched the Men’s Cricket World Cup Super League and on July 29, the ICC also confirmed that they will be focusing on the fixtures of the World Test Championship instead. July 30 marked the return of the league in South Hamptons. However, this will already be a part of the 2023 Cricket World Cup Qualification.
These are some of the biggest cricket leagues that will continue despite the pandemic. This is a good thing for fans and many people because sports can help uplift the spirits and boost the morale of many during this crisis. All of these leagues are also ensuring the safety of everyone involved.
