A new chapter has been added to the on-going Bangladesh T20 World Cup 2026 venue shift row, with the country’s sports minister stating they won’t compete at the cost of ‘national humiliation’.
Following the removal of Mustafizur Rahman from the Kolkata Knight Riders squad for IPL 2026, the Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) asked the ICC to have their T20 World Cup match venues moved outside of India.
While no concrete decision has seemingly been made over the matter so far, Bangladesh government’s sports minister, Asif Nazrul, as per Cricbuzz, said this to reporters following a meeting with BCB:
“We sat together with the BCB directors, Bulbul bhai, Faruque bhai and everyone else. Today we discussed the situation and we all agreed that Bangladesh earned qualification for the T20 World Cup through hard work. We are a cricket-crazy nation and we definitely want to play, but we do not want to play the World Cup at the cost of national humiliation,”
The ICC T20 World Cup 2026 begins February 7, 2026. Bangladesh’s first match is against West Indies in Kolkata at the Eden Gardens on the said date.
ICC Hasn’t Understood Our Security Concerns: Nazrul
The Bangladeshi sports minister went on to add that after receiving a letter on the matter from the ICC, they feel as if their security concerns haven’t been understood completely.
“After reading the letter we received from the ICC today, it felt to us that they have not fully understood the serious security situation that has developed in India for Bangladeshi cricketers,“
He intends to write another letter to the ICC regarding the venue-shift issue, and will take a decision based on what the response is from the apex cricket board.
“The letter [to ICC] will be sent tonight or by tomorrow morning and after that, whatever the situation becomes, we will sit and take a decision.“
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