The 2023 Cricket World Cup

First topic message reminder :

After the drama-free finish to the 2019 Cricket World Cup, the 2023 Cricket World Cup will finally get under way on the 5th October, having been initially delayed by Covid and then threatened by a Pakistani boycott.

England are the defending champions, and they're also the reigning T20 World Champions. Doubleplusgood, eh? They're looking to be the first nation to win consecutive ODI World Cups since the Aussie vintage of 1999-2007. Biggest adversaries to that are likely to be India, who haven't won a major global competition since the 2013 Champions Trophy, but will no doubt be heartened by the knowledge that the last three ODI World Cups have been won by a host nation.

Five-time winners Australia can never be ruled out, while Pakistan are fueled by a burning motivation to win the World Cup in the homeland of their greatest rivals. New Zealand have made the last two finals - losing the last on boundary count, would you believe? - and will hope to make the final step this year.

South Africa will presumably think they're due to win something, as they've not won a global competition since the 1998 Champions Trophy, while the Afghans will believe they can spin anyone into submission. Bangladesh will be hoping to make a sizable impact at the ODI World Cup for the first time.

Sri Lanka breezed through qualifying and will be encouraged by making the recent Asia Cup final, even if they did get hammered in said final. The Netherlands round off the ten teams after performing minor miracles in qualification, which of course means the West Indies, the winners of the first two ODI World Cups, will be missing out on this tournament for the very first time.

The ten-team format for the World Cup remains as simple as ever. Ten teams all play each other once, and the top four teams in the group at the end of it go through to the semi-finals, where it becomes a straight knockout. 48 matches total. There will be reserve days for the three knockout matches and, if necessary, Super Overs. But you can't win games on boundary count anymore...

Fixtures:

Tournament Odds:

Squad Lists (Teams have until the 28th September to finalise their squads):

So they haven't blown the tail away. Took Bumrah ages to even hit a ball but he's added some useful runs. 230 or so might be too many for England unless the batsmen can improve suddenly as well as the bowlers seem to have done today.
Good finish from Woakes (who was the imposter wearing his shirt these last few games ?) so 229 is all. Game on .

The only positive is india has runs on the board
Very difficult pitch, partisan crowd in a cauldron
From182-6 india went up to 230 that's 50 runs which I doubt if india could have scored if they needed those 50 chasing from their lower order

Eng have to be extremely cautious and play proper test cricket else they might slip

229. Well done England, that was good.

Should chase this 230, even if the batting is out of form. Get this win and the World Cup flame is still burning, just about.

Hmm. Only four bats got double figures. Suggests pitch rather tricky. Think England have a chance ; but wouldn't be putting money on them. As KP_fan says , will need to bat with a bit of care. And brains...neither of which have been on display much so far in the tournament.

As KP Fan says, Test cricket approach needed to win this. What we'll probably get: a series of hoicks to midwicket and comedy runouts

England win this by being positive. 50/0 after 8 overs, that sort of thing. Trying to grit it out likely won't end well.

Root gone first ball. 30/2.

England won't make 180.

Decent start with a bit of fortune, but then two in two to rock England back.

Think Root was unhappy with the ultraedge, but not enough on it to justify overturning.

England still favourites, but the middle order needs to justify themselves. Stokes to justify his recall and LL to justify his place over Brook.

Hope you are right , Duty. But I just can't see it. Middle order has been non-existent throughout the WC...asking a lot for them to suddenly turn it around. Haven't even started the trial by spin yet...

That innings from Stokes was genuinely one of the worst I've ever seen from a top order bat. Batted worse than Bumrah.

In the balance now, but England teetering dangerously towards another collapse.

...and there goes Stokes

Think any notion that England were "favourites" can be consigned to the bin. WINVIZ is rubbish as ever...

Stokes sadly looked like a tailender
What was he doing ?
Eng needed to get to 70-2 in 20

The inability to get out off needing to hit out even when there is no need has been thr malaise of Eng

Stokes hasn't been worth his place since coming back for the SA game, hasn't really done anything. The whole top 6 have played about 2 or 3 decent innings between them in the whole tournament so far, really has been woeful stuff

Said before the whole thing started : dragging Stokes back for this was a Bad Idea. Has taken away his best chance of a sustained rest to fix his knee : and served only to confuse England's selection in these games. Granted it was bad luck his copping another unrelated injury pre-tournament ; but with him unable to bowl (and still handicapped to some extent with bat and field) he was never likely to be much use.

Bairstow gone now too. Revise my previous comment. England won't pass 140...

Yeah, it's a tournament where batsmen are queuing up to make centuries, and England's batting has only made one between them. Awful effort. India haven't made many centuries either, but they've chased some low targets v Australia and Pakistan.

Bairstow gone now after a decent start. No fight again from England. Solid start at 30/0, now it's 39/4. Complete freeze under pressure.

It's been announced today that the 2025 Champions Trophy will be the top 8 sides in the table at this World Cup, a very real chance that that means no England.

India have bowled well , of course. But you can see the way the wickets have fallen the England bats are are scrambled in the head - don't know whether to defend or hit out...

Was obvious that chasing a modest 230 on this tricky pitch required a solid start - no need to rush : see off the dangerous bowling , look to keep the score ticking over without going too hard...almost Test Match batting. But as usual they really haven't had a plan at all.

I can't watch this rubbish any more . Time for bed.

James100 wrote:It's been announced today that the 2025 Champions Trophy will be the top 8 sides in the table at this World Cup, a very real chance that that means no England.

Cheers, didn't see that.

What a tinpot organisation the ICC is. Who on earth announces midway through a competition that said competition will be the qualification process for another tournament?

Someone relay it to England, it might provide the necessary motivation.

Probably once confirmed that India couldn't fail the qualification criteria, then a decision was made

It's Pak + top 7 that will qualify for CT
Commentators fell for DK's cowpat...
Ball doesn't turn when there is dew
And kuldeep turned one triple of what he did innfirst over

England can't pick Kuldeep.

But at least we know there will be something to fight for in the final few games. Missing out on the CT would be a humiliation, plus it would deny tournament experience to the England side heading for 2027 (perhaps the only 50 over tournament experience they'll have before the World Cup, with the domestic edition sidelined).

Not that it saves the batting but no excuse for Brook not to play the rest of the games

KP_fan wrote:It's Pak + top 7 that will qualify for CT

Assuming that's the official wording they're using, if Pak make the top 7 does the 8th team get in, or is there a spot up for grabs (to try and get England in somehow)?

Fine for England to have a bad tournament, it was gonna happen eventually after a run of success.

But they're behind Afghanistan and Netherlands on merit. This is has been a disaster way beyond the worst case scenario

Duty281 wrote:

James100 wrote:It's been announced today that the 2025 Champions Trophy will be the top 8 sides in the table at this World Cup, a very real chance that that means no England.

Cheers, didn't see that.

What a tinpot organisation the ICC is. Who on earth announces midway through a competition that said competition will be the qualification process for another tournament?

Someone relay it to England, it might provide the necessary motivation.

Absolute shambles. What a farce!

KP_fan wrote:

king_carlos wrote:The only way that more Tests get played by those nations is if the broadcasting is sold as a central rights package for one league. Then if broadcasters want the rights to India, England and Oz games they pay for the rights to everything. And broadcast it.

All Test nations are then given equal funding from that central pot to host and play Test cricket. Countries that can make more money from ticket sales, domestic leagues, advertising, etc etc can do so. They can reinvest that in their cricket as they please. The equal central funding would cover the necessities. If that funding covers flights and hotels for a 18-man touring party and the big three want to bring along a few more for net bowling then feel free by paying for it beyond that funding.

It wont happen though because the BCCI, ECB and CA wont relinquish power. The most depressing thing is that it's the power rather than money that they are relinquishing too. The bilateral model is absurdly inefficient at making money from broadcasting rights. Even the rights to show the last England series in India (a big three clash) went to Channel 5 for a pittance because they waited until a week before when the board got desperate for a broadcaster then lowballed. Selling the rights as a package would better monetise Test cricket. Which actually offers strong advertising opportunity to broadcasters. It's on through most the day, goes for 5 days and the captive audience are largely affluent. So in the medium run, let alone long run, they wouldn't lose money as the pot would get bigger. They would lose control though. And the big three would happily see most of cricket burn to the ground if they can still be lightly scorched zombie teams stumbling around in the ashes. The cartel would rather have control of a disaster than be part of something functional. It just makes me sad.

The Global cricketing rights are actually working quite close to  like you propose they should work.

-The total cricketing rights are in one ICC pot. This pot is roughly usd 630M for 2023
-90% of it is for 12 Full members (FM i.e test playing nations) & 10% is distributed for development of cricket among 90 odd Associate members ( AMs)
-the 90% itself starts with distributing equally among 12 FMs  that's  8.3% each  but then other "value to cricket criterias" take over resulting in India taking 38.5%  followed by Aus, Eng,  then Pak, SA then Rest
but even the rest are getting double digit million
-In return the FMs have to commit to a FTP  which includes a min number of tests
-the local Boards keep all the local revenues i.e ticket sales & local sponsorship and it's this component that struggles in low ranked FM nations

so ICC is not that bad....Aus, Eng Pak are taking upwards of 50M per year and SA about 30 to 40M  and rest all get atleast in double digit Millions
what I would like to see is ICC push more test match component in the FTP. The FM's comply to minimum because the secondary revenue i.e local sponsorships and ticket sales are lease for tests
and that's where ICC can find some more incentive from central pot for pushing a higher test match component.

source: July 2023 ICC meet
https://www.espncricinfo.com/story/bcci-set-to-get-nearly-40-of-icc-s-annual-net-earnings-in-new-revenue-distribution-model-1387167

That's the ICC broadcast rights. Which are for ICC events, rather than Test cricket.

My understanding is that England and Aus get just over £40m, Pak just below £40m and all the rest less than £30m a year.

It may sound a lot on the surface but for reference most Premiership rugby clubs in England, which is not a financially well-off sport currently, have operating budgets of £20m a year. For a domestic rugby club. Less than £30m for established nations such as NZ and well under £20m for Afg, Ire and Zim isn't going to cut it. NZ lose between £500k-£1m each time they host a Test IIRC.

My view is that Test cricket should be run as a genuine league, not a poorly constructed WTC bolted onto a rubbish schedule, with that broadcast package sold centrally similar to the ICC events broadcast rights. With that then split between the Test nations in order to play Tests. And split in a far more equitable way.

That might save Test cricket. The current model will just accelerate the race towards only the big three being able to play it seriously. I don't believe Tests will die in those three nations as they are too important to their individual financial models. Which is the sole concern. The others will be kept on life support to create the illusion of a wider sport the big three need to keep Tests barely relevant enough to make them significant earnings. If, by some miracle, a fourth nation looks at risk of getting off life support and learning to walk again then the cartel will quickly send a big bloke with a club round to break their legs. Which would most likely come in the form of a swiftly altered distribution model that is even less equitable. Or the big three just pulling out of tours to said nation at the last minute for 'reasons'.

Good Golly I'm Olly wrote:

Duty281 wrote:

James100 wrote:It's been announced today that the 2025 Champions Trophy will be the top 8 sides in the table at this World Cup, a very real chance that that means no England.

Cheers, didn't see that.

What a tinpot organisation the ICC is. Who on earth announces midway through a competition that said competition will be the qualification process for another tournament?

Someone relay it to England, it might provide the necessary motivation.

Absolute shambles. What a farce!

I usually find conspiracies in cricket silly. When the governance of the game are openly corrupt you don't need conspiracy. The abject running of this CWC by the BCCI and things like that with the Champions Trophy does genuinely make me wonder if the plan is to make ODI cricket as s**t as possible so they can then claim it's fine to kill it because it's s**t.

Lowlandbrit wrote:

KP_fan wrote:It's Pak + top 7 that will qualify for CT

Assuming that's the official wording they're using, if Pak make the top 7 does the 8th team get in, or is there a spot up for grabs (to try and get England in somehow)?

Yes, the 8th team would get in. So just look at the WC table, exclude Pakistan, and the top seven are through. Currently Bangladesh and England missing out.

GSC wrote:Fine for England to have a bad tournament, it was gonna happen eventually after a run of success.

But they're behind Afghanistan and Netherlands on merit. This is has been a disaster way beyond the worst case scenario

Agreed. Considering the on-paper strength of the team, this has been the worst 50 over World Cup in my lifetime. Worse than 1999, 2007 and 2015*.

At least in those years England expected very little, for good reason, and got very little. The 2023 England side has the potential to do so much better, and it'll be interesting to hear the fallout when it's all over.

*Major disappointments come in eight year cycles, we should have expected this!

I also find it amusing England aren't officially eliminated yet. The earliest it can happen is next Saturday!

Say what you like about the World Cup, but it's a very long process to get knocked out of it.

Afghanistan v Sri Lanka tomorrow. The winner will move to two points off the semi-final places. If Afghanistan could win this they've got a respectable chance of reaching the semis...

Eng team appear to be in denial
There was a lot of talk among TV commentators & then with Woakes after match & last few days I had heard Matthew Mott & Trescothik on  TMS
We don't know what's wrong with Eng

It's clear this world cup has rolled out two types of pitches...the 330-360 par
and the 275 par
Eng have gotten about 4 of the lower par pitches and have totally failed to accept ( I would not say not recognized) that they need to respect pitch / conditions and bat for 275
That keep going / keep hitting does not work....

They bowled well to keep India to 230.....but it was clear that they did not restrict Ind to a 230 on a 330 pitch
that the par itself was somwwhere between 215 and 250

And they needed to respect the conditions, the quality of attack, their own limitation and play classic build the inning, hold wickets in hands and polish off 230 in 48 overs with 6 wickets in hands clinicaly.

But they decided to "Keep going the 2019 way"
Stokes was seemingly fighting some inner demons and trying to show himself & as well as his mates in doubt
Look Bazballing works in test match like conditions and I will show you.
His moment of truth will be "How to play the test matches when the return after christmas & New Year back to India"

Eng are in denial to accept the 225-275 reality of pitches and play respecting the conditions....and if they come out of this denial......and play some boring & solid cricket...they can still finish in top-8 and qualify for CT

Do the West Indies no longer play cricket?

Duty281 wrote:

Lowlandbrit wrote:

KP_fan wrote:It's Pak + top 7 that will qualify for CT

Assuming that's the official wording they're using, if Pak make the top 7 does the 8th team get in, or is there a spot up for grabs (to try and get England in somehow)?

Yes, the 8th team would get in. So just look at the WC table, exclude Pakistan, and the top seven are through. Currently Bangladesh and England missing out.

btw this rule was made up by ICC yesterday.
Else until day-before it was the top-8 ranked team in ODIs will go through to play CT

king_carlos wrote:
That's the ICC broadcast rights. Which are for ICC events, rather than Test cricket.

My understanding is that England and Aus get just over £40m, Pak just below £40m and all the rest less than £30m a year.

It may sound a lot on the surface but for reference most Premiership rugby clubs in England, which is a financially well of sport currently, have operating budgets of £20m a year. For a domestic rugby club. Less than £30m for established nations such as NZ and well under £20m for Afg, Ire and Zim isn't going to cut it. NZ lose between £500k-£1m each time they host a Test IIRC.

My view is that Test cricket should be run as a genuine league, not a poorly constructed WTC bolted onto a rubbish schedule, with that broadcast package sold centrally similar to the ICC events broadcast rights. With that then split between the Test nations in order to play Tests. And split in a far more equitable way.

That might save Test cricket. The current model will just accelerate the race towards only the big three being able to play it seriously. I don't believe Tests will die in those three nations as they are too important to their individual financial models. Which is the sole concern. The others will be kept on life support to create the illusion of a wider sport the big three need to keep Tests barely relevant enough to make them significant earnings. If, by some miracle, a fourth nation looks at risk of getting off life support and learning to walk again then the cartel will quickly send a big bloke with a club round to break their legs. Which would most likely come in the form of a swiftly altered distribution model that is even less equitable. Or the big three just pulling out of tours to said nation at the last minute for 'reasons'.

makes sense that the model I quoted  was only ICC events
Tests right monies would go to hosting nation...
-Hence Big 3 between themselves earn big monies
-Pak-SA with big 3 earn decent monies
-non big-3 with India earn decent monies
-to keep WTC interesting & tests relevant in their own markets the BIG-3 know that they need to  drop enuf feed in front of the other 9 or 10 ( If Ned get included)

I am not concerned about future of test cricket....because it's recognized in Ind, Aus, Eng big-time
and has enuf mass appeal in BD, SL, Pak, NZ and SA
Only Zim, WI & IRE are in woeful condition w.r.t  Test Cricket.....and I believe the big-guys will not miss their pitiful status and do something eventually   

my Worries are:
1- Bilateral ODIs are becoming totally irrelevant.....I have been calling these Meaningless-Masala-ODIs for some time now
And that it's still the most viable format to do the Main world cup

2- That there are too many word-cups....the 20 overs world cup every 2 years does not make sense.
It should be once in 4 years or gotten rid of completely to preserve the sanctity of The world cup

3- Others need to get-together esp Aus & Eng to curtail the highhandedness of BCCI down to reasonable levels

KP_fan wrote:makes sense that the model I quoted  was only ICC events
Tests right monies would go to hosting nation...
-Hence Big 3 between themselves earn big monies
-Pak-SA with big 3 earn decent monies
-non big-3 with India earn decent monies
-to keep WTC interesting & tests relevant in their own markets the BIG-3 know that they need to  drop enuf feed in front of the other 9 or 10 ( If Ned get included)

I am not concerned about future of test cricket....because it's recognized in Ind, Aus, Eng big-time
and has enuf mass appeal in BD, SL, Pak, NZ and SA
Only Zim, WI & IRE are in woeful condition w.r.t  Test Cricket.....and I believe the big-guys will not miss their pitiful status and do something eventually   

my Worries are:
1- Bilateral ODIs are becoming totally irrelevant.....I have been calling these Meaningless-Masala-ODIs for some time now
And that it's still the most viable format to do the Main world cup

2- That there are too many word-cups....the 20 overs world cup every 2 years does not make sense.
It should be once in 4 years or gotten rid of completely to preserve the sanctity of The world cup

3- Others need to get-together esp Aus & Eng to curtail the highhandedness of BCCI down to reasonable levels

Yep, the bilateral model is dependent on teams reciprocally touring nations that come to them. The home team then makes money on each leg. Increasingly we see the big three expecting teams to play longer touring series than home ones though. It's just a s**t model.

I think Test cricket outside the big three will remain but I think it will whither in quality under this system. The Proteas are scheduled to play 6 home Tests and 6 away in the 2023-25 WTC. They aren't scheduled to play against England or Australia. As said, they will notionally be kept on life support as the funding required to do that will lose the big three less money than these sides disappear entirely as the Windies may do.

On 1, I'd happily see bilateral T20is to disappear except for the year before a World T20. Simply as they are mostly well below the level of the better franchise leagues. The IPL is way ahead of them. Even the PSL and CPL sees better cricket than many bilateral T20s though.

On 2, there are too many world cups. The reason is that they are the only means for the ICC to make money and therefore keep a modicum of power against the big three. Which in loops back to the bilateral system not working but only being there as it allows the cartel to keep power.

On 3, the ECB and CA are complicit in the BCCIs highhandedness. They decided early on when Indian cricket exploded that they'd rather be the next biggest fish in a f***ed system than still very large fish in a functioning one. Why would they want to risk becoming the fourth and fifth most prominent nations in a vibrant and flourishing sport when they can be second and third biggest in a rotting and shrinking one? It's a pathetic position to have taken. But they took position early on, then rigged the system to keep them where they are. N Srinivasan, Giles Clarke and Wally Edwards legacy for world cricket.

Back on the CWC. Bumrah is astonishing. He's got an economy of less than 4 in this tournament whilst bowling in the PP and death. It's just remarkable. Like looking at figures from a previous era. A bit like Viv's ODI stats looking like they come from the current era as he was so far ahead of his time. Bumrah is so far in front of his peers here that his stats have gone back in time to scorecards from Joel Garner's era.

It's a shame he's had injuries as Bumrah is quietly the all format bowler of our time. Averaging 22 in Tests at a great economy and SR, with magnificent performances away from home. In T20s he's clearly the best seamer and only Rashid Khan would really challenge him as best bowler. In ODIs he is now the best bowler going given that Mitch Starc isn't quite at the heights he once was with the white ball.

Just brilliant. If we are looking for excellence across the three formats he may just be the best all format player of this period, let alone bowler.

Virat at his peak was astonishing in all forms but then he had that lean period in Tests particularly. Smith, Root and Williamson are brilliant but notably weaker in T20s. I actually think Root could be better than the other two in T20 but he hasn't played as much. Even then, Root isn't going to be near best two in the world in T20 with the bat. Babar is excellent across formats but doesn't have Bumrah's impact.

Cummins is outstanding in Tests but weaker with the white ball. Rabada is brilliant across formats but not on Bumrah's level as a white ball cricketer.

Ashwin and Jadeja are magnificent Test bowlers, whilst Jadeja is a brilliant white ball cricketer. Neither have that impact across formats though. Peak Shakib is probably in a similar bracket. Though I often feel it's underappreciated how good an Test and ODI all-rounder Shakib was at his best. Duty might put Moeen in this bracket too. I'm a fan, but, not quite convinced.

Which leaves Stokes. He too has done exceptional things in all three formats. Some of the best Test knocks I've seen, winning efforts in CWC and World T20 finals. All-rounders, back when he had two legs, generally have that bit of mystique around them in these discussion too of course. He has those big accomplishments. Even if a Test series in India or Australia are yet to be amongst them.

Bumrah's numbers are better. He has those two series wins in Australia as well which are huge milestones. Other England fans here disagree but I feel like England really lost that 2021 series at home too. Yes, the official score line ended 2-2 when the 5th Test was finally rearranged in 2022. When that 2021 series was postponed with India up 2-1 I honestly thought England looked cooked though. I really didn't see them coming back to take that 5th Test had it been played straight after the Oval loss where Bumrah's bowled, bowled spell of searing pace to Pope and Bairstow broke England's chase.

Wherever he's ranked, Bumrah is some cricketer.

Duty281 wrote:Afghanistan v Sri Lanka tomorrow. The winner will move to two points off the semi-final places. If Afghanistan could win this they've got a respectable chance of reaching the semis...

Given the respective draws , Sri Lanka have a better chance than Afghanistan (if they win this one). But realistically they are both going to have to make do with qualification for the Champions Trophy at best.

Duty281 wrote:

Lowlandbrit wrote:

KP_fan wrote:It's Pak + top 7 that will qualify for CT

Assuming that's the official wording they're using, if Pak make the top 7 does the 8th team get in, or is there a spot up for grabs (to try and get England in somehow)?

Yes, the 8th team would get in. So just look at the WC table, exclude Pakistan, and the top seven are through. Currently Bangladesh and England missing out.

Thought so, just wouldn't have surprised me if they'd looked at the standings and tried to give themselves an out.
Nice of England to try and get NL more meaningful games at least.

Going to be tough for England to qualify for CT now...even assuming Bangladesh keep failing , even winning against Netherlands probably won't be enough to get out of bottom two.

Need to either win at least two of last three and/or hope Netherlands or Afghanistan lose the lot...the first of those propositions seems unlikely !

alfie wrote:

Duty281 wrote:Afghanistan v Sri Lanka tomorrow. The winner will move to two points off the semi-final places. If Afghanistan could win this they've got a respectable chance of reaching the semis...

Given the respective draws , Sri Lanka have a better chance than Afghanistan (if they win this one). But realistically they are both going to have to make do with qualification for the Champions Trophy at best.

I'd say Afghanistan have the easier remaining fixtures, but it is marginal.

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