The International Cricket Council (ICC) has confirmed the PNG Garamuts’ qualification for the ICC U19 Men’s World Cup to be held in the Caribbean in 2022.
This was announced as the ICC confirmed that the Americas, Asia and East Asia Pacific Qualifiers had been cancelled due to COVID-19. The ICC development committee therefore were forced to base their guidelines for qualification on winning results over the past five U19 qualifying events in each respective region.
ICC Head of Events, Chris Tetley, said: “It is incredibly disappointing that the three regional qualifiers to the ICC U19 Men’s Cricket World Cup have been cancelled due to COVID-19. Under the Member approved guidelines, where teams have withdrawn due to the impact caused by the pandemic, we had no other alternative but to cancel these events.
“We have worked closely with all members to try to ensure results can be determined on the field of play, however for these events, it was not possible.”
Cricket PNG CEO, Greg Campbell, said it was not the ideal way to qualify for this prestigious event but they have had an extremely good history of success with their U19s.
“They have qualified for seven out of the last nine World Cups. We are thankful for this opportunity again and our Garamuts will represent PNG and our EAP region with pride in 2022.”
National Coach, Carl Sandri, shared similar sentiments, saying: “It’s fantastic news and we look forward to competing in the Caribbean in 2022.
“The downside is the Garamuts miss out on the valuable match competition from the qualifiers. Also the experience of what for most would be their first overseas trip, this is an important step in their development. International cricket for the under-aged sides is under resourced so to miss the opportunity to play in the qualifiers is disappointing.
“We will move forward though and prepare our squad for the World Cup.
“We will exhaust every avenue to get the boys some quality lead up cricket prior to the event. Hopefully the COVID-19 situation is much improved by then and we can source some cricket overseas on our way to the World Cup.”
The ICC also granted Canada and the UAE automatic qualification under these terms and are still hopeful the remaining two qualifying events, Europe and Africa, can proceed in the next month.
The five Associate Member qualifiers will then join the Full Member nations in the World Cup which will be held in January/February 2022.
(Current Barra, Simon Atai, playing in the 2018 U19 Garamut side)