2023 is going to be a treat for cricket fans around the world. Recently the 16th edition of the Indian Premier League finished with yet another excellent season of Twenty20 cricket.
Currently, the World Test Championship Final is ongoing between India and Australia to decide who crowns them the Test Champion, which will soon be followed by the Ashes, and later in September.
However, most eyes will be on the ODI World Cup to be held in India from October onwards, with reigning champions set to defend their title against the best cricketing countries in the world.
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When will the 2023 ODI World Cup fixtures be released?
There is however still no clue as to what the 2023 ODI World Cup's schedule will look like and which venues will host the games to be played with four months remaining before the tournament commences.
Both the 2018 and 2015 editions of the World Cup had seen the tournament's schedule released. For the 2015 tournament in Australia and New Zealand, the schedule was released 18 months in advance in July 2013, while the 2019 edition held in England and Wales saw the schedule released 13 months before the competition. Thus, the situation with the current World Cup looks unusual.
Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) secretary Jay Shah had said that the schedule would be released during the ongoing WTC Final, however, International Cricket Council chief executive Geoff Allardice speaking to BBC's Test Match Special seemed to suggest there's still no conclusion on the World Cup schedule.
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"I think even today (Wednesday) we might be receiving the schedule from the hosts, and we've just got a bit of consultation to do with all the participating teams and the broadcasters. Then we'll be publishing that as soon as we possibly can," Allardice said.
"And in some places, there's a lot of consultation that needs to take place, both within the cricket system and with governments, etc. There's a lot of responsibility on a host to deliver a good event, and they've got to go through the right checks and balances."
When asked about whether Pakistan's indecisiveness in playing in India had a role to play in the delay of the release, Allardice avoided the question and further elaborated that his events team was working hard to put up a schedule and he expects something to be finalised by the end of the coming week.
"Until I see the schedule… I'm waiting, and I'm hoping that I'll see something in the next day or two on that. Our events team is very experienced at putting on cricket events in all different countries, and you control what you control. And I think that's the approach that our team is taking, and they're working on the things that they can progress for the event. The moment we have that information, we'll be pushing on it at a rate of knots," he stated.
From Allardyce's statements, it's likely we get a schedule for this World Cup by the end of the coming week.
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