Wake up ICC!! The Minnows are closing the gap in the shortest format
ICC T20 World Cup 2026
The ICC T20 World Cup is into the 10th edition right now. 19 years since it was first started in 2007, a total of 25 teams have participated in the competition. This year we have 20 teams after ICC's decision to expand the competition two years ago in 2024. That decision saw three news teams debuting in 2024: USA, Canada and Uganda. Another debutant Italy became the 25th team when they played their maiden World Cup game against fellow Europeans Scotland on Monday.
For the last few years, we have seen the Associates running the Full-member nations close with a few upsets as well creating some attention. But those moments have been quite rare and only on certain occasions i.e. Netherlands in 2014 and 2022, USA in 2024 has an Associate nation managed to grab a few eyeballs with their performances. This year however, things look entirely different. In the 9 games played so far, we have seen some encouraging performances from the lower ranked teams giving the favorites a run for their money and almost causing a few upsets only to falter at the end due to a few mistakes of their own.
Netherlands and Nepal almost managed wins against Pakistan and England respectively, missing the mark by a small margin in the death overs. USA started off in a fine fashion against hosts and defending champions India opting to bowl and forcing them at 77-6 only for Surya Kumar Yadav's outrageous innings to help his team win by 29 runs at the end. Ireland bowled beautifully against co-hosts Sri Lanka and had them in a pickle after the first 16 overs but a horrible show in the field allowed Sri Lanka to add 59 runs in the last 24 balls and end up winning the game by 20 runs. More dropped catches of Faheem Ashraf by Max O'Dowd and Surya by USA's Shubham Ranjane off his own bowling in the 10th over became the catalysts off these wins or else who knows we might've seen two serious Associate wins on the opening day off the World Cup.
Max O'Dowd's crucial catch drop of Faheem Ashraf in the 19th over costed Netherlands a chance to win their opening game of Group A against Pakistan.
What has been special to see in this event is how the Associate teams have planned their batting innings. The focus has been on rotating the strike and minimizing the dot balls targeting one boundary per over in the middle. Nepal's approach in the chase was bang-on. Both Rohit Paudel and Dipendra Singh Airee picked the gaps beautifully and maneuvered the field to stay in touch of the required rate. Nepal hammered both Jofra Archer and Adil Rashid, both England's premier fast bowlers, an unusual sight. Netherlands' approach until the 16th over was also alike only to unravel in the death. Ireland also played in a similar way but their inability to target spin became their kryptonite on a fine evening in Colombo.
Nepal showcased their growth in International cricket by almost winning their opening game against two-time T20 WC winners England
With the increase of T20 leagues every year, the opportunities have also increased for the players all over the world. Even the associate nations have focused on such non-affiliated leagues in their own domestic structure to give their players a certain match scenario. UAE's Muhammaed Waseem, Namibia's Gerhard Erasmus, Netherlands' Logan Van Beek and Roelof van der Merwe, Ireland's Paul Stirling and Josh Little, Nepal's Sandeep Lamichhane are few of the names who have been part of these leagues over the world. The ILT20, MLC and Nepal Premier league in recent times have attracted excellent International players. A new European league is also in the works where Ireland, Scotland and Netherlands will be the primary participants. Not only does it give these players enough chances to play against such quality but the time spend with these players and the knowledge transfer aids the development of these nations and the rapid growth can be seen on the global stage.
But even then there is a common pattern emerging in the results which is their inability to deliver killing blows. The lack of killing instinct led to Netherlands, Nepal, USA, Ireland and even Scotland losing the game after being in a comfortable position. This bridge can only be narrowed down by giving these teams regular exposure against International teams. And it's not like these contests have been one-sided. After a long time we are now seeing Associate teams grabbing on every single opportunity they are being presented. This all started before the start of T20 World Cup 2024 when USA defeated Bangladesh 2-1 at home in a three-match series. UAE then trumped Bangladesh 2-1 at Sharjah in 2024 and Nepal did the same to West Indies 2-1 at the same venue. Namibia's last-ball win over South Africa in 2025 at the inauguration of their new Namibia cricket ground was one of the biggest victories by an Associate nation in a bilateral clash. Italy recently won their first game against a full-member nation by defeating Ireland in Dubai.
Still there is a huge gap in the opportunities these teams are getting against top-ranked full-member nations. The Associates have been crying for more and more chances to showcase their talent and the highest cricketing body needs to listen now. They reduced the 50-over World Cup from 14 to 10 for the 2019 and 2023 editions for some reason and only after Netherlands managed to qualify and topple South Africa as well as Bangladesh in the 2023 World Cup did ICC decide to bring the number back to 14. The regulars of the cricketing circuit choose their Future Tours Program on a four-year window filling it with more bilateral cricket against the same Test-playing nations. Global T20 leagues also help the host boards by creating enough revenue to sustain their cricket forward. Associates on the other hand need a lot of help as there is no major revenue coming and they have to rely mostly on the ICC.
Will the ICC give more playing chances to the Associates against top-ranked cricketing nations in the future?
Their lack of chances can also be observed in the preparation as part of a build-up to this year's World Cup. Since the end of the last World Cup in 2024, 6 of the 9 Associate nations have played less than 25 T20Is with UAE and Oman being the only exception playing at least 41 and 27 T20Is respectively. Canada played 25 games. We can count out Scotland from this list as they were not slated to be part of this World Cup but still the numbers are disappointing. Italy, who are making their debut for this event played only 7 games in this period, 3 of them thanks to Ireland who approached them to organize a last minute 3-match series in UAE for their own practice. Even Ireland played only 19 games, 5 of which were rained out. Their board decided to schedule 8 games in the last 4 months, all in Asia and this is a Test-playing nation we are talking about. Same goes for Afghanistan who are on a non-bilateral radar of teams like Australia, England, South Africa due to their ongoing political condition which means they are left with limited options thus playing only 21 games in this period.
Given the operation value of a T20 game, there can be a straight-forward solution at least when it comes to the build-up of an ICC tournament like this. Apart from the regular five test-playing sub-continent sides there were at least three other Asian participating in this year's competition. A tri-series of at least 6 games could have been organized in each of UAE, Nepal and Oman for the original 8 participating Associate nations and Ireland giving each team some game time in similar spin-friendly conditions. Something similar can be adopted for tournaments in Europe with Ireland, Netherlands, Scotland and maybe Italy, Africa with Zimbabwe, Namibia and Uganda maybe, North America with USA, Canada and somewhere in the West Indies. PNG and the non-playing Australian and New Zealand cricket grounds can be used for the same for Oceania-based tournaments.
The advent of all new T20 leagues has created a general hangover of the T20 format as well as created an unfortunate declining interest in the 50-over format for the fans. The bigger question here is, Are the same bilateral series creating any kind of significance for the game's expansion? Will the fans not be interested to see Associate nations creating more and more such memories to register against top-playing cricketing nations in different conditions, a trailer of which we are already able to see in the initial phases of this year's World Cup?
The ICC needs to seriously re-think their strategy for the shortest format. A pinch of these innovations can breathe a new life for International cricket and attract new fans from emerging countries increasing the reach of cricket as a global sport.
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