ICC announces schedule for Women's World T20 Qualifiers

Dubai, Aug 8: Defending champions Bangladesh will play Papua New Guinea while previous runners-up Ireland will take on Namibia on the opening day of the Women's T20 World Cup Qualifier 2019 to be held in Scotland from August 31 to September 7.

The league-cum-knockout tournament, which decides the two qualifiers for the Women's T20 in Australia in 2020, will also see Scotland take on the USA and Thailand fight it out with the Netherlands, as all eight teams play on the opening day at the two venues -- the Forfarshire Cricket Club in Dundee and the Arbroath Cricket Club. 

Namibia were named as a replacement for Zimbabwe, having finished second in the Africa regional qualifiers earlier this year, while the Netherlands (Europe), Papua New Guinea (East Asia-Pacific), Thailand (Asia) and the USA (Americas) made it after winning their respective qualifying events. Scotland qualified as hosts.

The eight teams are divided into two groups to decide the semi-finalists, with the winners of the two semi-finals ensuring a place at the ICC Women's T20 World Cup 2020 to be held in the Australian cities of Canberra, Melbourne, Perth, and Sydney from 21 February to 8 March next year. 

Bangladesh, Scotland, PNG and the USA form Group A, while Group B consists of Ireland, Thailand, Namibia, and the Netherlands. The teams also get to play a warm-up match each ahead of the tournament, on August 29.

Both semi-finals (on 5 September) and the final will be played at the Forfarshire Cricket Club with the final to be played on September 7.