India Sports

T20 Cricket World Cup History

Wales Cricket Board (ECB) and England had discussed the game's shortened format on a professional level in 1998 and 2001. After the end of Benson & Hedges Cup in 2002, ECB required another competition that was just for a day to take its place. The cricketing authorities had to find ways to boost cricket and make it popular again among the youngsters to get some revenue through sponsorships.

This shortened version of the game was to provide with fast paced and an exciting cricket, which thousands of fans can see who were bored with the longer versions. ECB's marketing manager Stuart Robertson suggested a 20-over cricket match to the county chairmen in 2001. The game was hence voted and adopted for the new format. The media was called for a unique name for the game. The title Twenty 20 was chosen, which was also referred to as T20 cricket. However, Dr George Christos, Western Australia's mathematician from Perth also claims that he had proposed the similar ideas to ECB and ICC in 1997. But, ICC dismissed Christos involvement for the final concept development.

In 2003, Twenty20 cricket was introduced formally. During this time, ECB launched 'Twenty20 Cup'. The T20 Cup was marketed all through the country with a slogan 'I don't like cricket, I love it', which was extracted from 'Dreadlock Holiday' of 10cc. The first Twenty20 match was played on June 13, 2003, in England. This match was between English counties for the Twenty20 Cup. This first ever season was very successful. The match was won by Surrey Lions by 9 wickets against Warwickshire Bears. On July 15, 2004, the first T20 match between Middlesex and Surrey held at Lord's attracted almost 26,500 people. This number was the biggest since 1953 for county cricket game compared to any one-day final.

For ICC World Twenty20's inaugural event staged in South Africa from September 11 to 24, 2007, India was the first winners of the tournament. India won by 5 runs against Pakistan at Johannesburg. For this inaugural match, Yuvraj Singh hit six sixes in a row in just one over. Chris Gayle also managed to score the first-ever hundred for the Twenty20 International. The second tournament was held event in England from June 5 to 21, 2009. Pakistan was the champion by 8 wickets of this tournament and it defeated Sri Lanka at Lord's, London. Tillakaratne Dilshan was the man of the tournament. From April 30 to May 16, 2010, West Indies had hosted the third ICC World Twenty20 tournament. Englands won by 7 wickets, defeating Australia at Kensington Oval, Barbados. England won this tournament of ICC for the first time. The 2014 ICC World Twenty20 is expected to be held at Bangladesh and the one after that will be held at India.





Last Updated on October 19, 2022