‘Have security concerns or whatever concerns…they should be scrapped’
Former England opening batter Mark Butcher has backed the ICC’s decision to remove Bangladesh from the T20 World Cup 2026 after the latter refused to travel to India due to security concerns. Butcher reckons that the ICC needs to make a clear plan going forward for the teams that won’t travel to the host nation of the ICC events.
Bangladesh were scheduled to play three games against West Indies, Italy, and England at the Eden Gardens in Kolkata before making a trip to the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai against Nepal. They were later replaced by Scotland.
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“The ICC had a choice to make at that point: do they do what actually should happen from now on in? This is a precedent that I think is worth following, that when a team, whether it’s through their government or it’s off their own bat, has security concerns or whatever concerns about visiting a country for a tournament, then basically they should be scrapped and the next cab off the rank qualifies, and you go ahead without them,” Butcher has expressed on the Wisden podcast.
Butcher has also questioned the decision to bring Scotland in place of Bangladesh, given that they finished under Jersey in the qualifiers, which should be the main aspect for the qualification. Despite that, the ICC brought Scotland through the T20I rankings.
“There have been a lot of preceding events – not to this particular farrago – that have parallels. Obviously, the India Champions Trophy issue with Pakistan and how that ended up being resolved with India playing matches in Dubai, including the final. We’ve had tournaments, kind of re-jigged and re-arranged to accommodate one team or another throughout the history of the game of cricket,” Butcher addressed in Wisden.
“I think the India example for the Champions Trophy, everyone could see that coming, that was so obvious that you could see it from space, that that was going to be the position. I’m certainly not being naive in thinking that everyone else stands in the same position in India, because they don’t,” The former batter concluded.
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