USA Cricket has expressed its disappointment at the announcement today from the International Cricket Council (ICC) that the ICC Men’s Under 19 Cricket World Cup Qualifier, Americas for 2021 is officially cancelled.
In recent months, USA Cricket has been working closely with both ICC Americas and all of the other participating nations to explore all possible options to ensure the event could safely be played, including by delaying the staging of the event for as long as possible, putting in place robust medical protocols to support the hosting of the event in the USA and by offering to give up the right to host the event and to play instead in any other country in the region.
Unfortunately, and despite those efforts, the other participating teams all eventually withdrew from the event because of challenges that they faced relating to the management of COVID related restrictions and risk, and in the circumstances, the ICC had no option but to cancel the event.
Iain Higgins, Chief Executive of USA Cricket, said, “We are all devastated with the cancellation of this event, particularly given the lengths which we had gone to in order to make ourselves available to participate in a qualification event of some kind, no matter where it was played nor the opposition. However, we understand that we are living through challenging times when it comes to international travel and competition, especially where it involves minors, and, though bitterly disappointed, we respect the decisions of our colleagues in the Americas region and acknowledge that the ICC ultimately had no alternative but to cancel the event.”
We know that our wider Men’s Under 19 playing group, who have worked so hard this year, are especially disappointed, and our focus now is to ensure that there will be some good quality replacement cricket for them over the coming months. Given the success of the Men’s U19 National Championships, and the two U19 preparation camps we have had in 2021, players and parents are understandably upset by the news. We will continue to provide coaching support and individual performance plans to the group at the same time as we work on a number of separate opportunities to provide the selected U19 team with a program of competitive cricket over the next few months.”
To see the ICC Media Release in full, please click here.
