People are wondering why the Barbados women’s team is playing T20 cricket instead of the West Indies women at the 2022 Commonwealth Games despite having a better ICC ranking
Fans really flocked to their TVs for the next 11 days as the Birmingham Commonwealth Games (CWG) 2022 got underway today (July 29, 2022). As cricket returns to the CWG this year after a 24-year absence, supporters have more reason to celebrate this year.
Why the Barbados women’s team is playing cricket at the 2022 Commonwealth Games instead of the West Indies team
While Machel does a live preview on our YouTube channel for the West Indies T20, I’ll be watching the women’s action as Barbados take on Pakistan pic.twitter.com/C5JSbqlxh7
— Caribbean Cricket Podcast (@CaribCricket) July 29, 2022
The 1998 CWG in Kuala Lumpur featured men’s cricket and South Africa won the gold medal after defeating Australia in the final. The best part of this year’s edition as fans are excited is that women’s cricket is being played for the first time in a multi-sport competition.
However, a topic that frequently came up on social media was the absence of the West Indies from the competition. People often wondered why the Barbados team was competing instead of the West Indies team.
But before we find out why, first let’s take a look at some of the important details of the women’s cricket game in CWG 2022 this year:
More on women’s cricket in CWG 2022
Only the T20I format will be used during the CWG 2022 competition and eight national teams have qualified. The first match, between Australia and India, was being played on July 29 at the Edgbaston Cricket Ground in Birmingham, where all the matches will be played.
Australia, India, New Zealand, South Africa and Pakistan also qualified for the competition based on their ICC T20I rankings, however, England qualified automatically because they are the hosts.
Sri Lanka won the qualifying round by beating Bangladesh in the final in January this year, expanding the competition to seven teams.
But Barbados’ women’s teams have gained a lot of attention. So let’s find out how they fared in CWG 2022.
How did Barbados women’s team fare in CWG 2022 instead of West Indies?
The West Indies Women’s team was ranked in the top six in the ICC Women’s T20I table and therefore qualified automatically, however, they are not competing in the CWG competition in 2022.
Six Caribbean countries are represented in the Commonwealth Games Association, which hosts the tournament for Commonwealth countries. Since the CWG is a multi-sport event and all Caribbean countries act as a single entity, the West Indies cannot participate without the consent of other countries.
To select the qualifying squad from among six countries – Barbados, Guyana, Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, and two additional teams from the Leeward Islands and the Windward Islands – a regional T20 competition was set for 2020 and 2021.
However, the competition was postponed on both occasions due to the Covid-19 pandemic and the Barbados women’s team, which had won the T20 Blaze in the previous edition, was named the qualifying team for the CWG 2022.
Hayley Matthews, a star all-rounder for the West Indies, and Deandra Dottin will captain the Barbados Women’s team against Pakistan Women on Friday, July 29.
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