The Wanderers cricket ground in Joburg. Picture: Gallo Images
The 2027 Cricket World Cup in South Africa will be played at eight venues, including the big five regular Test grounds — the Wanderers in Johannesburg, SuperSport Park in Centurion, Newlands in Cape Town, Kingsmead in Durban and St George’s Park in Gqeberha.
The three other grounds in South Africa that will host matches are the Mangaung Oval in Bloemfontein, Boland Park in Paarl and Buffalo Park in East London.
This has been confirmed to The Citizen by Cricket South Africa, with a spokesperson saying the grounds to be used were decided on when CSA submitted their bid for the tournament several years ago.
The grounds to miss out are Benoni, Potchefstroom and Kimberley, though they hosted matches in 2003 when South Africa last hosted the 50-overs Cricket World Cup.
On that occasion South Africa were eliminated in the early stages of the competition following a misreading of the Duckworth-Lewis-Stern method. Australia went on to win the title following the final at the Wanderers.
Matches at the 2027 World Cup will also be staged in Zimbabwe and Namibia, though there are no details about the venues to be used in these neighbours of South Africa.
It is likely Harare and Bulawayo in Zimbabwe and Windhoek or Walvis Bay in Namibia will host group matches.
According to a report on Netwerk24, the eight venues in South Africa to host matches were picked because of their proximity to an airport and the availability of hotel rooms.
The tournament is scheduled for October and November 2027.
South Africa were awarded the rights to host the 2027 World Cup in 2021 when the ICC revealed the tournament schedule through to 2031.
The next big limited overs World Cup takes place in June this year when the United States and the West Indies jointly host the next edition of the men’s T20 World Cup. In February next year Pakistan will host the Champions Trophy and in 2026, India and Sri Lanka will host the T20 World Cup.
Following South Africa’s hosting of the 50 overs tournament in 2027, Australia and New Zealand will host the 2028 T20 World Cup and a year later India will host the Champions Trophy.
In 2030 England, Scotland and Ireland will jointly host the T20 World Cup while India and Bangladesh will host the 2031 50-overs World Cup.
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