Over the coming three weeks, the cricketing community will get a first-hand look at the next generation of the sport’s superstars as the Under-19 World Cup takes place in New Zealand.
Over the coming three weeks, the cricketing community will get a first-hand look at the next generation of the sport’s superstars as the Under-19 World Cup takes place in New Zealand.
So who is involved, where are the games and how can you keep up with all the action?
The Cricketer has all the answers.
Come on now, pay attention. It’s the Under-19 Cricket World.
Well, all the best young players from across the planet are involved in the competition, which features more teams than your average, senior Cricket World Cup.
A total of 16.
All the obvious big names - Australia, England, India, Pakistan etc - plus some associate nations that you’ll have seen in the odd major tournament at senior level down the years.
They’re split up into four groups, as follows...
Group A: New Zealand, South Africa, Kenya, West Indies
Group B: India, Australia, Zimbabwe, Papua New Guinea
Group C: England, Bangladesh, Namibia, Canada
Group D: Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan, Ireland
The tournament is due to get under way this weekend, with four matches scheduled for Saturday. Then there’s a packed fixture list right the way through the competition’s duration.
The knockout rounds begin on January 22, with the semi-finals on January 29 and 30 and the final on February 3.
Their opening game, against Namibia on January 15 and their group campaign is stuffed into a single week. Bangladesh are the second opponents on January 18 and Canada follow on January 20. In the UK, the matches start the previous evening at 9.30pm, due to the time differences involved.
New Zealand. The event is being staged across six venues - Cobham Oval in Whangarei, Lincoln No 3 in Lincoln, Bay Oval in Mount Maunganui, Queenstown Events Centre in Queenstown, Hagley Oval in Christchurch and Mainpower Oval in Rangiora.
After a round-robin group stage, the top two move into the Super League element of the competition - though it’s not a league structure. For instance, first in Group A will play second in Group D, and so on and so forth.
There is also a Plate competition, for the teams who finish in the bottom half of their pools, which will run concurrently.
Well, England are in Group C. The winners are due to face the team that finishes runners-up in Group B, and vice versa. That more than likely means one or other of Australia and India.
That’d be West Indies, who beat India in the final of the 2016 tournament - held in Bangladesh.
The ICC’s global broadcast partner, Star Sports, will be providing a full service from New Zealand, where Sourav Ganguly and Tom Moody will be among the commentary team.
Sky Sports have the UK rights and will be showing at least the first two England games live, as well as producing highlights shows. All that is available on Sky Sports Cricket.
The full broadcast partners list looks like this: tar Sports (India and the rest of the Indian Sub-continent), Sky Sports (United Kingdom & Republic of Ireland), SuperSport (South Africa and Sub-Saharan Africa), OSN (Middle East & North Africa). Fox Sports (Australia), Willow TV (USA), Sky TV (New Zealand), Ten Sports (Pakistan), ESPN (Caribbean), Gazi TV (Bangladesh), SLRC (Sri Lanka) Fox Networks Group (South East Asia) and ATN (Canada).
The BBC also has rights to host nearly-live in-game clips on its website.
The Cricketer will have match reports from each England match during the competition.
India are currently a best-priced 11/4 with the bookies, with Australia available at 3/1. The rank outsiders are Papua New Guinea at 1,000/1, while England are a best-odds 9/1.
You’re more than welcome.
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