The 2024 edition of the ICC Women's T20 World Cup has been moved from Bangladesh to the United Arab Emirates (UAE). The decision was taken at the ICC board meeting where travel advisories from governments of several participating nations meant that the cricketing boarding had to move the tournament out of Bangladesh, which is going through political turmoil due to large-scale protests. Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe too had expressed their interest in hosting the tournament but the UAE got the nod.
“It is a shame not to be hosting the Women’s T20 World Cup in Bangladesh as we know the Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) would have staged a memorable event,” ICC Chief Executive Geoff Allardice said in a statement on Tuesday, August 20.
BCB will retain the hosting rights as did India when the UAE last hosted an ICC event, the men's T20 World Cup in 2021 alongside Oman. "I would like to thank the team at the BCB for exploring all avenues to try and enable the event to be hosted in Bangladesh, but travel advisories from the governments of a number of the participating teams meant that wasn’t feasible. However, they will retain hosting rights. We look forward to taking an ICC global event to Bangladesh in the near future," Allardice added.
"I’d also like to thank the Emirates Cricket Board for stepping in to host on behalf of the BCB and Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe for their generous offers of support, and we look forward to seeing ICC global events in both of those countries in 2026."
The tournament is scheduled to be held from October 3 to 20 at three venues in the UAE, Sharjah, Abu Dhabi and Dubai. The defending champions Australia, India, New Zealand, Pakistan and Sri Lanka are drawn in Group A while England, Bangladesh, Scotland, South Africa and the West Indies are in Group B. The top two teams from each group will play in the semis before the winners of the two semi-finals contest for the trophy.
