After submitting a bid some months back, Botswana Cricket Association (BCA) has been successful in their bid hence being identified as the International Cricket Council (ICC) Women’s T20 world cup qualifiers host for Africa.
The qualifiers are a pathway to the Women’s T20 world cup 2023 which will be held in South Africa from 9th to the 26th of February 2023.
Countries that will be part of the qualifiers include hosts Botswana, Cameroon, Namibia, Nigeria, Malawi, Mozambique, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Tanzania, Uganda and Zimbabwe, and only one team goes through to the next stage which is the world cup.
According to BCA’s secretary general Sumod Damodar confirmed that they have been identified as the host and they are looking forward to be the hosts. He said “As far as Africa is concerned, we have 11 teams that will be competing, which is a lot more than the other teams in the other regions, despite the numbers we only have a similar slot in the world cup which is only one.”
“The qualifiers that we will be hosting is scheduled for October 2021, from January we will be monitoring where we are with respect to covid19, noting the differences of hosting under normal circumstances as well as hosting under covid 19 pandemic,” Damodar opined.
Moreover, Damodar noted that they are prepared to host the qualifiers hence they saw the need to make the bid. He said “towards the event is the most important time to implement what needs to be done after seeing what is in store for us for the year 2021.”
“It is going to be a very competitive tournament, all 11 teams fighting for a spot in the world rankings, the gap between most of these teams will be narrow, we have Namibia which has been part of the previous qualifiers,” added Damodar.
Damodar further added that given the time ahead of them, team Botswana can put their foot down and focus on qualifying. He said “They may also want to use home advantage hence why the need to prepare well on time.”
“We are two steps away from going to the world cup, and it is a lot closer for women than it is for men, we need to grab this opportunity with both hands and be realistic about it,” noted Damodar.
In conclusion, Damodar added that at the end of it all they have a great opportunity that they can use to put the country’s flag on the continent through cricket.
