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Suggest Your Cricket World Cup Format

Valer

First Class Debutant
Groups are anti-climatic. Play double elimination if you HAVE to have some form of safety, I'd rather just a seeded 16 team single elimination. Short and sweet. As a bonus it makes all the lead-up super important for rankings.
 

flibbertyjibber

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The best world cup for me was the 1992 one but that format doesn't work now with more teams and more good associate nations. Not really sure what the answer is but having a 2nd group phase makes it too long a tournament. We have a fine line between not enough games and far too many, in the West Indies world cup it seemed to go on for ever and ever and that clearly isn't what you want.
 

Howe_zat

Audio File
Groups are anti-climatic. Play double elimination if you HAVE to have some form of safety, I'd rather just a seeded 16 team single elimination. Short and sweet. As a bonus it makes all the lead-up super important for rankings.
You can't have half the players go home after one game.
 

Lillian Thomson

Hall of Fame Member
I don't mind the 10 team pool as it means all the top nations get to play each other (which is presumably what the TV companies want). I would have one proviso where Bangladesh, Zimbabwe and England have to play-off with the top three associate members to determine the final three slots in the competition.
 

Hurricane

Hall of Fame Member
I guess before I post an opinion I would like to hear from GF or Uppercutt or someone from a country that can be classified an associate.
Questions
1) How much press is there about a world cup in your country when you qualify for it
2) How much does it mean to other players at grass roots levels
3) How much does it help the game

I played in Canada in a year when Canada qualified. There was no coverage at all on TV = and a brief mention on the radio when Canada had beaten a test playing nation - I tuned in and turned it up but found out the country was Bangladesh.
We all went over to a mates place and watched Jon Davison smash a century in record time but Canada still lost.

The world cup probably gave the players on team canada something aspire to - but it did nothing for me or my mates or for cricket in general in our country.

That said I am biased against the Canadian cricket team as so few of them are born in Canada.
 

cnerd123

likes this
Hong Kong didn't know or care about being in the World T20 FWIW. I tried to beg and persuade my local friends to come out and watch the games in a pub with me but they all refused. Local Chinese here tend to actively hate cricket, instead of just being indifferent. It's a race/social/cultural thing.

However, their performances did get good coverage in the sports section of newspaper. The expat population here showed good support too.

Back in UAE the National team gets plenty of press, coverage and support; altho expats will support their home nation over UAE and don't show much loyalty to the Nat side, so whether or not they do well in the WC doesn't make a huge difference to them. The expat population of UAE have no loyalty to the country.

In contrast, my Nepali friend told me that the people were cricket-crazy back at home during the WT20. Even he streamed every match live, and he normally isn't a cricket fan. During the WT20 he was the one providing me with score updates!
 

Marius

International Debutant
Back in UAE the National team gets plenty of press, coverage and support; altho expats will support their home nation over UAE and don't show much loyalty to the Nat side, so whether or not they do well in the WC doesn't make a huge difference to them. The expat population of UAE have no loyalty to the country.

In contrast, my Nepali friend told me that the people were cricket-crazy back at home during the WT20. Even he streamed every match live, and he normally isn't a cricket fan. During the WT20 he was the one providing me with score updates!
Yeah, I've heard cricket is becoming big in Nepal.

I wonder what kind of coverage it gets in Ireland, and how it was covered in Kenya before their cricket infrastructure collapsed.

All this moot really, cricket as a global game will be dead in 20 years, as the ICC strives to keep the Indian beast content.
 

Furball

Evil Scotsman
I guess before I post an opinion I would like to hear from GF or Uppercutt or someone from a country that can be classified an associate.
Questions
1) How much press is there about a world cup in your country when you qualify for it
2) How much does it mean to other players at grass roots levels
3) How much does it help the game

I played in Canada in a year when Canada qualified. There was no coverage at all on TV = and a brief mention on the radio when Canada had beaten a test playing nation - I tuned in and turned it up but found out the country was Bangladesh.
We all went over to a mates place and watched Jon Davison smash a century in record time but Canada still lost.

The world cup probably gave the players on team canada something aspire to - but it did nothing for me or my mates or for cricket in general in our country.

That said I am biased against the Canadian cricket team as so few of them are born in Canada.
Cricket in Scotland is actually pretty widely played. It gets no significant press other than when we're in a World Cup though.

Same with other "minority" sports - Rugby League very briefly had a profile up here during the last World Cup. For any sport to have a chance at growing then you need to give the game a profile in countries where it struggles for one.

And maybe it's just me, but I see the same faces in international cricket face off all the time, and I'd see the same faces in the bajillion T20 leagues springing up around the world if I bothered watching any of them. The World Cup's charm is finding out about players that I don't see all the time.

I'd go 16 teams in 4 groups of 4, and then ideally into straight knockout though I'd be prepared to accept 2 groups of 4 as a sop to TV. But the issue with the World Cup format is this stupid insistence that as many top teams play each other as much as possible. That and overlong group stages. Howe's brought up England in the last World Cup, all our dumbass defeats meant nothing because there were enough games to put it right. I gets PEWS point about meaningful games but groups of 4 with top 2 progressing still allows for upsets - 1 daft result cost Pakistan and India in 2007 after all.
 

Flametree

International 12th Man
The purest format is 4x groups of 4 followed by knock-outs. But India and England won't ever agree to a format that might see them knocked out after 3 matches.

Given that and given a World Cup without associates is a joke.... the least bad compromise imo would be two groups of 6 or 7, everyone playing everyone else in their group. Then straight into semi-finals.

Every team gets 5 matches, the early rounds should be relevant as everyone will still be in with a chance, and if the downside might be too many dead late matches then arrange the draw so that teams seeded 2-5 in each group play each other late on.
 

gvenkat

State Captain
The 2003 and 1999 world cup formats were reasonably good. Since the group matches had some relevance. The super six is kind of a drag. So I would suggest

Have 14 teams, 7 teams of two groups each.

The group winners qualify directly to Semi-Finals. A1 vs B1, Play a single game to decide their place in the semi-final line up. Winner will be seeded 1, Loser Seeded 2.

A2 vs B2 Play a knock out to determine, Who goes on to take the third seed place. Winner Takes seed 3 position. Loser will not get eliminated.

A3 vs B3 play an Eliminator to Determine who plays the loser of A2 vs B2.

So in Essence we will have 42 group games, With relevance.

4 Knock Outs, 2 Semis and 1 Final

So for instance Going by last World Cup standings

From Group A

Pakistan
Sri Lanka
Australia

From Group B

South Africa
India
England


Pakistan vs South Africa qualify Directly for Semis and Play one game to determine who is ranked 1. Assuming SA won

Srilanka vs India - Determines Third seed. Assuming India won.

Australia vs England - Eliminator . Assuming Aus Won They will play SL for the 4th spot.

We would have SF line up of SA vs SL and Ind vs Pak.

A fair format. Given that is how the semis stacked up. Of course NZL upset SA.
 
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gvenkat

State Captain
I guess before I post an opinion I would like to hear from GF or Uppercutt or someone from a country that can be classified an associate.
Questions
1) How much press is there about a world cup in your country when you qualify for it
2) How much does it mean to other players at grass roots levels
3) How much does it help the game

I played in Canada in a year when Canada qualified. There was no coverage at all on TV = and a brief mention on the radio when Canada had beaten a test playing nation - I tuned in and turned it up but found out the country was Bangladesh.
We all went over to a mates place and watched Jon Davison smash a century in record time but Canada still lost.

The world cup probably gave the players on team canada something aspire to - but it did nothing for me or my mates or for cricket in general in our country.

That said I am biased against the Canadian cricket team as so few of them are born in Canada.
Excellent point.
 

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