T20 World Cup 2024: Threat looms over marquee event as weather destroys facilities to cancel USA-Bangladesh warm up fixture

Dallas Stadium. (Photo Source: X/Twitter)

Ahead of the much-awaited T20 World Cup 2024 opener, the weather has yet again started playing possums with cricket. This time just days before the tournament opener, a grave threat looms over the upcoming games as the first warm-up fixture between Bangladesh and USA (United States of America) has been struck by flash floods. As a result, the match has been called off.

Notably, both teams were supposed to clash against one another at the Grand Prairie Stadium in Dallas, Texas. But the weather created some adverse situations for the organisers. It was revealed earlier that during these floods, the newly installed sight screen for the World Cup was broken. Even though a temporary sight screen was arranged for the recently played T20I series between both teams, it will be a double-up effort for the International Cricket Council (ICC) and USA Cricket to arrange a good quality sight screen before the T20 World Cup commences. In the same vein, Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) confirmed the news of the cancellation of the warmup game.

“This is to confirm that the warm-up match between Bangladesh and the USA at the Grand Prairie Stadium in Dallas today has been cancelled due to the conditions of the facilities following the adverse weather that has affected the area,” BCB said in their statement.

Bangladesh will play against India in second warm-up game of T20 World Cup 2024

Meanwhile, speaking of the recent performances of the Bangla Tigers, they suffered a huge upset as host USA trumped them by a 2-1 margin to claim the T20I series. However, as a matter of some respite, the Asian nation was able to claim a thumping victory by 10 wickets in the last game of the series. Hence, they were itching to get the better of the rising cricket nation through their World Cup warmup fixture but it wasn’t meant to be.

Moving forward, now Bangladesh led by a young skipper in Najmul Hossain Shanto will square off against Team India in their next warmup fixture which will also be their final match in the warmup phase arranged by the ICC. Notably, the T20 World Cup 2024 is scheduled to begin on June 2. Having said that, Bangladesh will start their campaign on June 8 against another Asian nation Sri Lanka.