BCCI are bound to make changes to India’s opening fixture in 2019 World Cup as per the Lodha Committee recommendation. India will open their 2019 World Cup campaign against South Africa on June 4 instead of June 2.
The matter was discussed during the ICC Chief Executives Meeting in Kolkata.
“The 2019 IPL will be played between March 29 and May 19. But we need to maintain a 15-day gap and World Cup starts on May 30. Therefore as per 15 day gap we could have only played on June 4. Earlier, we were scheduled to start on June 2 but we couldn’t have played on that day,” a senior BCCI official told PTI on conditions of anonymity, as reported by Times of India
“South Africa are our first opponents. The CEC agreed and the matter has been referred to the ICC board,” he further added.
Interestingly, ICC has opted to start various marquee events with a Indo-Pak clash which is a crowd puller and promises to be a full house. However this will not happen in the 2019 World cup.
“This is the first time Indo-Pak match won’t be a starting affair. Since the format will be a round robin affair (all teams playing each other like 1992),” the official added.
Among the other decisions that were formalised included the FTP for the next five year cycle from 2019-23.
“As we had decided, India will play a maximum 309 days of international cricket in this cycle across formats, a reduction of 92 days from the earlier cycle.
“However the number of home Test matches will increase from 15 to 19. All these Tests will be part of the World Test Championship,” he added.
The official also confirmed that India will not play any Day/Night Test match for now as it’s not a part of World Test Championship.
“All matches in ICC World Test Championship are day matches played with red ball. If that’s the case, there is no point in playing pink ball Tests if it doesn’t help in preparation for World Test Championship,” he concluded
