LONDON: The inaugural Euro T20 Slam, a Twenty20 franchise tournament with six teams from Scotland, the Netherlands and Ireland, has been postponed until 2020, the organisers said on Thursday.

The cricket boards of Scotland, the Netherlands and Ireland had agreed in March to form a new European league, developed in consultation with the International Cricket Council (ICC), to be held from Aug 30 to Sept 22. The organisers did not provide a detailed explanation for the decision, citing ‘unforeseen circumstances’.

“The Board of the Euro T20 Slam, funding partners and franchise owners of this exciting new T20 tournament have reluctantly come to the decision that staging of the event will not be possible in 2019,” board member Prashant Mishra said in a statement.

The tournament schedule had already been released. Six city-based franchise teams, two from each country, were set to play 30 group-stage matches followed by semi-finals and a final in Dublin.

Stars such as New Zealand’s Martin Guptill and Brendon McCullum, South Africa fast bowler Dale Steyn, England’s World Cup-winning skipper Eoin Morgan, Pakistan’s Shahid Afridi, Australia’s Shane Watson and Afghanistan leg-spinner Rashid Khan had all been lined-up to play.

Published in Dawn, August 16th, 2019