ICC announce schedule for 2022 Women's World Cup

Hosts New Zealand will open the tournament against a qualifier in Tauranga on March 4 and Christchurch will host a floodlit final at Hagley Oval on April 3 off the back of a semi-final and three group matches

The ICC has announced its revised schedule for the 2022 Women’s World Cup in New Zealand.

There will be 31 matches played in the 31-day event across six cities on both the north and south islands: Auckland, Christchurch, Dunedin, Hamilton, Tauranga and Wellington.

The tournament will be the first global women’s tournament to be held since the T20 World Cup earlier this year. It will be succeeded by the Commonwealth Games in Birmingham later in 2022.

Hosts New Zealand will open the tournament against a qualifier in Tauranga on March 4 and Christchurch will host a floodlit final at Hagley Oval on April 3 off the back of a semi-final and three group matches.

New Zealand, Australia, England, South Africa and India have qualified for the World Cup. The three remaining teams will emerge from the ICC qualifying tournament which is confirmed to take place from June 26 – July 10 2021 in Sri Lanka. 

The eight-team round-robin format will see all teams play each other, with the top four teams qualifying for semi-finals. The winners of the competition will take away £2,882,550.

_{New Zealand's Amy Satterthwaite and Lea Tahuhu pose with Sir Richard Hadlee and the ICC Women's World Cup trophy}

ICC chief executive Manu Sawhney said: “The ICC has made a long-term commitment to elevating women’s cricket as part of our strategy to grow and develop the global game.

“We want to build a sustainable foundation for women’s cricket. It is about building a product that fans want to watch, that kids want to take up, that sponsors and broadcasters want to be part of. This schedule takes the world’s best cricketers across New Zealand and can help inspire a generation of girls and boys to take up the game. 

“We are extremely proud of the significant progress we have made in increasing prize money for ICC events over the last few years, with the ICC Women’s Cricket World Cup 2022 in New Zealand having £2,882,550 available in prize money, an increase of almost 60% on 2017 and more than 1000% compared to 2013.”

ICC Women's Cricket World Cup chief executive Andrea Nelson added: “Our team is proud to be delivering a tournament where Kiwis across the whole country, in each of our six host cities, can really get involved in what is a truly special event. We can’t wait to see the excitement build around New Zealand as we prepare to roll out the welcome mat for the rest of the world.

“Major events like this one are all about creating a genuine legacy for the sport and we are proud to say our tournament was the catalyst for the installation of the Hagley Oval lights. I’d like to thank the New Zealand Government and the Canterbury Cricket Trust for making that happen.”

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