In between the Premier League season, rugby union’s Six Nations and the Winter Olympics, it has been easy to miss much of the ongoing T20 World Cup in India and Sri Lanka.
Yet the tournament has not helped itself with a drawn-out format that has seen little jeopardy and a succession of low-key matches that have failed to capture the public’s imagination.
Only Zimbabwe’s shock wins against Australia and Sri Lanka have generated genuine interest – and that is mainly because the unfancied African nation, ranked 11th in the world, effectively dumped the Aussies out of the tournament in the first round.
This was in spite of the format, not because of it. The most damning takeaway is that this World Cup was designed so badly – with a pre-determined Super 8 group for each team before a ball was bowled – that every team who topped their group are now playing each other in the Super 8 phase. Conversely that also means that each of the second-placed teams, including England, are also grouped together.
It means an England team that has largely failed to hit anywhere close to their best will, thanks to the kindest of draws, qualify for the semi-finals on Tuesday if they beat Pakistan in their second Super 8 game in Pallekele.
Australia have already been dumped out of the tournament (Photo: Getty)The Super 8 phase itself is a clunky compromise that ekes out more high-profile games for broadcasters at the expense of genuine jeopardy.
One small tweak would transform the tournament – just scrap the Super 8s and have quarter-finals following the group stage, where teams were put together in four sections of five.
It would cut the fat from a tournament where teams can recover from defeats that would, in most other World Cups, be terminal to their chances.
Take India. They lost their opening Super 8 match to South Africa by 76 runs but remain the favourites to win the whole thing with bookmakers.
Why? Other than playing at home, it is because they will reach the semi-finals with victories against the West Indies and Zimbabwe in their last two Super 8 games. One win may even be enough if one of those fixtures is rained off.
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The ODI World Cup is little better. An interminable affair that is stretched out over six weeks, the tournament has, for the past two editions, seen a round-robin first round where every team plays each other. It also only accommodates the top 10 teams in the world.
This is expanding to 14 in 2027, when the World Cup will be played in southern Africa, where the first round will be split into two groups of seven, with the top three in each qualifying for a Super 6 stage.
However, cricket can do so much better. There is a way of expanding both World Cups, keeping largely the same number of games and injecting jeopardy into the format.
The answer? Make both tournaments 24-team affairs with a standardised group phase of six groups of four.
Mirroring the format used in the football World Cup from 1986 to 1994, this would allow 16 teams to advance into the knockouts, where there would be far more games with something on them.
Yes, a first round where many of the teams are from less-established nations would create more one-sided games initially but in the long-term this would help the non-Test nations to become more competitive and, crucially, liven up the tournament from the last-16 onwards.
In this format, there would be 51 matches overall, slightly down on the number for the current T20 and ODI World Cups. This would require three games to be played per day during the initial group phase but given this was already happening in this current T20 World Cup, it is not much of a leap.
How to inject jeopardy into cricket’s World Cups
Increase the number of teams across the T20 and ODI World Cups to 24. Have six groups of four with the top two and the four-best third-placed teams in each qualifying Play eight last-16 knockout ties, then quarter-finals, semis and a final In the T20 World Cup this could be achieved in 31 days – up from the current 30 – by playing three group games per day over 12 days. After a three-day break, play the eight last-16 games over four days – two matches per day. After a one-day break, the four quarter-finals over four days and then the semis and final after two sets of two-day breaks This format would see 51 matches in total. Currently the T20 World Cup has 55 and the ODI one 54 (from 2027) Only have seedings in the group stage so that where you finish matters In the 50-over World Cup, this format could be played over 35 days, with the last-16 matches reduced to one per day. This would shorten the tournament by 10 days (the last one in India was played over 45 days) Each host would need 12 venues (three per group) to make this work. England and India could easily achieve this and it would also work elsewhere in the world with neighbouring joint-hosts – for example, Australia and New Zealand, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, West Indies and United States, South Africa, Zimbabwe and NamibiaIt might prove more challenging in the ODI tournament but in an age of live streaming where all 18 games in the final round of football’s Champions League group stage are televised simultaneously, this should not be hard to do.
Would it be perfect? Absolutely not but it would be so much better than the broken, boring and largely jeopardy-free World Cups we are currently being asked to consume.
You could still even accommodate the lucrative India vs Pakistan first-round match that is guaranteed in every global event thanks to the value it adds to broadcast rights deals into any new model.
Granted, a radical change in World Cup formats is unlikely. Yet the International Cricket Council should be looking at ways to inject their marquee events with more jeopardy and drama.
After all, what else have they got to do?
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