2022 ICC Women's World Cup - Everything you need to know
Written By: Ritwika Dhar
Date: 03-03-2022
Picture Courtesy: ICC
The biggest carnival of Women’s cricket, the ICC Women’s World Cup 2022 is upon us. The 12th edition of this global event is going to be held at one of the picturesque destinations in the world, New Zealand from March 4 to April 3. Here’s everything you need to know before it kicks off:
Rescheduling of the World Cup
This premier 50-over tournament was supposed to be held from February to March 2021. But in August 2020, it was postponed until 2022 because of the Covid outbreak. On 15th December 2020, ICC confirmed the World Cup will take place from 4th March to 3rd April 2022.
8 qualified teams
6-times champion Australia, last edition’s semi-finalist South Africa, 2-times finalist India and defending champion England directly qualified for the World Cup through the rankings in the ICC ODI Championship 2017-2020 and New Zealand on the basis of being the hosts. Whereas Bangladesh, West Indies, and Pakistan qualified due to their better rankings as WC Qualifiers in Zimbabwe got abandoned mid-way due to the breakout of Omicron. Bangladesh will be playing their first 50-over World Cup.
Round-robin and knockout format
All the eight sides will compete against each other once in a single league format. This format was used in the last edition in 2017 as well. After battling it out in 28 group matches, the top four teams will march through to the semi-finals. And the winners from both the semi-finals will lock horns in the final on 3rd April.
Venues
The venues for the World Cup in New Zealand are:
The semi-finals will be held on 30th March and 31st March, at Wellington and Christchurch respectively. And the final will take place at the Hagley Oval on 3rd April.
Tweaked playing conditions for the World Cup amidst the COVID scare
Teams will be able to field with as few as nine players, with the remaining two female members of support staff acting as substitute fielders. Those substitute fielders would not be allowed to bat or bowl.
In the first place, ICC had allowed squads to increase the size and to bring additional traveling reserves so that they can replace on a temporary basis in case of any injury or Covid.
As far as the results are concerned, it has been officially stated by ICC that Super Overs will come into effect to ensure the results are achieved both in the group stage and in the knockouts. There will be unlimited Super Overs till the result comes and there won’t be any boundaries countback in that process.
Complete list of the Match Officials
A total of 8 women have been included among the 15 match officials chosen by ICC to adjudicate this month-long mega event.
Facts: England’s Suzanne Redfern is the first person to have played and then officiated at the World Cup. She represented England as a player in the World Cup 1997 and officiated matches in the World Cup 2017.
Hike in Prize Money
The victorious team of the tournament will take home prize money of $1.32 million, which is double the amount that was awarded to the winners in the 2017 edition in England.
The overall sum of the prize money has also seen a hike of 75%. The 8 teams will take home a share of $3.5 million ($1.5 million more than the last edition).
The runners-up will be awarded $600,000 ($270,000 more than the last edition). The two losing semi-finalists will also be awarded $300,000 each and the four teams who exit at the group stage will earn a sum of $70,000 ($30,000 more than the last edition).
With every group stage victory, the team will earn a reward of $25,000 from the total pot of $700,000.
For the complete schedule of the World Cup, check out the Schedule section of our page, Cricket Queens -> World cup fixtures