The points table of the ongoing ICC Cricket World Cup 2023 will also decide which eight teams will qualify for the ICC Champions Trophy tournament which will be played in 2025. The tournament will be hosted in Pakistan.
As per ESPNCricinfo report, an ICC spokesperson confirmed that the qualification system for the 2025 Champions Trophy was approved by the ICC Board in 2021 when the competition was brought back as one of the eight men's global tournaments to be held in the 2024-31 cycle.
This development has surprised a few of the cricket boards, including the teams who are playing the World Cup in India and the teams who missed making it to the ongoing event. The boards said that they were unaware of qualification for the 2025 Champions Trophy being at stake in this tournament.
At present, Bangladesh and England are at No. 9 and 10 on the ODI World Cup points table, and therefore outside the top seven who will qualify for the Champions Trophy along with hosts Pakistan.
This also means other Full-Member nations like West Indies, Zimbabwe, and Ireland won’t get an opportunity to qualify for the ICC Champions Trophy as they failed to qualify for the ongoing World Cup in India.
In November 2021, the ICC unveiled several global events for both men and women in the new cycle (2024-31) including two editions of the Champions Trophy - in 2025 and 2029. Champions Trophy will be an eight-team event and format "will follow previous editions with two groups of four, semi-finals and final".
For the 2013 and 2017 editions of the Champions Trophy, the top eight teams in the ODI rankings at a cut-off date qualified for the event. It is understood that the decision to have the top seven teams in this World Cup qualify for the 2025 Champions Trophy was first accepted by the ICC's chief executives’ group, and then supported by the ICC board.
One Full Member of board confirmed that the qualification pathways for all the events were discussed and approved at the 2021 ICC meetings.
For the 2027 men's ODI World Cup, which will be a 14-team tournament co-hosted by South Africa, Zimbabwe, and Namibia, the qualification process is the two Full Member hosts - South Africa and Zimbabwe - plus eight highest-ranked teams as of March 31, 2027, and four remaining teams through global qualifier tournaments.
(ESPNCricinfo reports)
