Current champion Ireland Tournament format League system Number of teams 95 nations | First tournament 2007–09 Most successful Ireland (2 victories) | |
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Administrator International Cricket Council Website ICC World Cricket League Most runs Paras Khadka (1505) (Nepal) Most wickets Basanta Regmi (103) (Nepal) Format One Day International; List A | ||
The ICC World Cricket League is a series of international one-day cricket tournaments for national teams without Test status (of Associate or Affiliate status), administered by the International Cricket Council. All associate and affiliate members of the ICC are eligible to compete in the league system, which features a promotion and relegation structure between divisions. The league system has two main aims: to provide a qualification system for the World Cup that can be accessed by all associate and affiliate members, and as an opportunity for these sides to play international one-day matches against teams of similar standards.
Contents
In the inaugural ICC World Cricket League 2007–09, teams were allocated into divisions based on their performance in the qualification tournaments for the 2007 World Cup; the six initial teams in Division One were the teams that qualified for the 2007 World Cup. The initial series began with regional qualifiers and a First Division in 2007, and ended with the 2009 ICC World Cup Qualifier. At this stage, there were only five divisions.
The second cycle began in 2009 with three additional divisions.
Structure
The initial league began in 2007 with seven tournaments over five global divisions, based upon previous world rankings. This was expanded into eight separate divisions for the 2009–13 edition. In the first cycle, the number of teams in each tournament varied from six to twelve. With the advent of the second cycle, the number of teams has regularised to six for each tournament, with the exception of the lowest division, Division 8, in which eight teams play. The final of each cycle, the World Cup Qualifier, contains twelve teams as it is a combination of Divisions 1 (all 6 teams), 2 (top 4 teams) and 3 (top 2 teams).
When most of the divisions are played, two teams will be promoted, two relegated and two remain for the next instalment, two years later. There are some occasions when this is not the case. When Division 8 is played, though two teams are promoted, only one remains and the bottom five drop out of the system. They are replaced by the top five teams from recent regional events for the next instalment. At the end of each cycle, the World Cup Qualifier is played featuring the top twelve teams. According to the results, the top six qualify for Division 1 of the next cycle. The teams that finish seventh to tenth in this tournament proceed to Division 2 and the bottom two are relegated to Division 3. Teams in Division 1 gain ODI status and the top four qualify for the Cricket World Cup. In addition, there is no promotion or relegation so the teams remain until the next World Cup Qualifier is played.
Regional tournaments, which acted as qualifiers for the lower divisions of the first cycle of the World league, and continue to do so for Division 8 in subsequent cycles, are administered by the five Development Regions of the International Cricket Council: Africa, Americas, Asia, East Asia-Pacific, and Europe.
Associate and Affiliate one-day rankings
In late 2005, the International Cricket Council ranked the top non-Test nations from 11–30 to complement the Test nations' rankings in the ICC ODI Championship. The ICC used the results from the 2005 ICC Trophy and WCQS Division 2 competition (i.e. the primary qualification mechanisms for the 2007 Cricket World Cup) to rank the nations.
These rankings were used to seed the initial stage of the global World Cricket League. Teams ranked 11–16 were placed into Division 1; teams 17–20 were placed into Division 2; teams 21–24 were placed into Division 3; the remaining teams were placed into the upper divisions of their respective regional qualifiers.
Since 2005 six associates have held One Day International status, based on their performance at the most recent World Cup Qualifier. Afghanistan and Ireland both appear on the main rating table and Scotland, UAE, Hong Kong and Papua New Guinea appear on the secondary table. The winner of the 2015–17 ICC World Cricket League Championship will play-off against the lowest associate in the ODI Championship for a place there for the next 4-year cycle. In May 2009, the ICC added a rankings table for the associate and affiliate members containing both global and regional placings. In 2016 this changed to maintain a global list only for the top teams and a set of regional lists for the remaining teams.
Rankings
The global rankings of associate and affiliate teams according to ICC are published in the table below. Teams that have One Day International status are ranked by their win percentage against other Associates with ODI status. The other teams are ranked by their finishing position in the most recent qualifying tournament.
The rankings as of 15 November 2016, updated after the World Cricket League Division 4 played in the United States, are:
Regional rankings
Teams that do not participate in (or have been relegated from) the World Cricket League are ranked by their finishing positions in their respective regional leagues: