Officials of major cricket centres disappointed over missing out on World Cup 2023 matches - Reports

Officials of some major cricket centres are said to be disappointed over not being allocated any games for World Cup 2023, which will be held in India from October 5 to November 19.

The International Cricket Council and the Board of Control for Cricket in India on Tuesday (June 27) announced the much-awaited schedule for the ODI World Cup 2023. Ten enues will host 48 games, which will be played in the round-robin and knockout format.

Among the prominent venues to miss out include Indore, Mohali, Rajkot and Nagpur. According to news agency PTI, officials from these big cricket centres have expressed disappointment and surprise at missing out on hosting games for the grand event.

Abhilash Khandekar, president of Madhya Pradesh Cricket Association, was quoted as telling PTI:

"Indore hosted a World Cup game between Australia and New Zealand back in 1987. We feel bad that Indore has been left out. I don't know the compulsions of the BCCI. Indore has a rich cricketing history, and, therefore, we expected it to be a venue of the World Cup.”

Further, a source from the Punjab Cricket Association told the news agency that they tried hard but were not allotted any World Cup 2023 games. The source was quoted as saying:

"It seems only metros and cities where the office bearers are from have got games. We pushed for it really hard but could not get a game. Disappointing not to get even a practice game.”

The report added that while the World Cup is an ICC event, the governing body often backs venues proposed by the host board, which is the BCCI for the 2023 World Cup.

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List of World Cup 2023 venues

The ten venues for the 2023 World Cup are Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, Dharamsala, Delhi, Chennai, Lucknow, Pune, Bengaluru, Mumbai and Kolkata. Barring the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium in Hyderabad, which will host three games, all other nine venues have been given five games apiece.

The Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad will host the tournament opener between England and New Zealand, the marquee India-Pakistan clash on October 15 and the grand final on November 19.

The two semifinals of World Cup 2023 will be played at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai and Eden Gardens in Kolkata on November 15 and November 16, respectively.