The wait is finally over— the ICC T20 World Cup is all set to begin on Sunday with the match between Sri Lanka and Namibia at 10 am (Bangladesh time).

A total of 16 teams are participating in the T20 World Cup. In the first phase, eight teams will lock horns. The top four of them will qualify for the Super 12s round of the event. Bangladesh will directly take part in the Super 12s.

The Tigers will start their World Cup by taking on the runners-up of Group A of the first round on October 24 in Hobart.

Bangladesh team has already reached Australia after their horrible campaign in the Tri-Series in New Zealand where it lost all four matches against the hosts and Pakistan.

Ahead of the event, the captains of all the participating teams have a media session in Melbourne where they had a great meeting with each other. Captains took part in photo sessions and answered the questions of the media representatives.

While replying to a question, Bangladesh captain Shakib Al Hasan said they are hopeful of doing well in Australia. He also said this is the first time when Bangladesh are going to play T20I matches in Australia— the fact that made many surprised.

T20 cricket became an international format back in 2006, and after 16 years, Bangladesh are going to play their first T20I in Australia— of course, a surprising fact!

Bangladesh made two changes to their original T20 World Cup squad— adding Soumya Sarkar and Shoriful Islam overlooking underperforming batter  Sabbir Rahman and allrounder Mohammad Saifuddin.

Ahead of the main event, Bangladesh will take on Afghanistan and South Africa in two warm-up matches on October 17 and 19. Both matches will be played at Allan Border Field in Brisbane.

India, Pakistan, England and Australia are among the favourites to win this year’s T20 World Cup, according to the analyst.