ICC Women's World Cup 2021 to kick-off at Eden Park
The ICC Women's World Cup 2021 will commence with hosts New Zealand taking on a Qualifier on February 6 at the Eden Park in Auckland. The ICC released the 31-match schedule on Wednesday. The games will be held across six different venues in the country. In a massive relief to the participating nations, all three knockout games will have reserve days.
Christchurch will host the final on March 7
Auckland, Hamilton, Tauranga, Wellington, Christchurch and Dunedin will play host to the group-stage games. The two semi-final matches will be held at Tauranga and Hamilton on March 3 and March 4 respectively, while the final will be played in Christchurch on March 7 under lights. Hamilton will host the maximum number of games (seven) in the tournament, including the semi-final.
Four teams have already secured qualification
As many as four teams have already qualified for the World Cup so far. Defending champions England, Australia, South Africa and hosts New Zealand have already qualified, leaving four spots vacant. The other teams will be confirmed after the conclusion of the Women's Championship. Further, another subsequent qualifying event will be hosted by Sri Lanka in July this year.
Eight teams will battle it out in the round-robin format
The tournament will see the eight teams facing each other once in the league stage. Following the conclusion of the group stage, the top four teams will then progress to the semi-finals. Australia and New Zealand will lock horns in what is expected to be a high-voltage Trans-Tasman clash on February 13. Before that, the Australians will take on England on February 7.
2021 tournament to see massive jump in the prize money
The upcoming edition of ICC Women's World Cup will see a massive jump in the prize money. "We are proud of the significant progress we have made in increasing prize money for ICC events with Women's Cricket World Cup 2021 having $NZD 5.5m available in prize money compared to $NZD 3.1m in 2017 and $NZD 316,000 in 2013," ICC CEO Manu Sawhney said.
