NEW DELHI: The 2026 T20 World Cup has started with the associate teams punching above their weight and has given a scare to the cricket heavyweights.On Sunday, Nepal came agonisingly close to registering the biggest win in their sporting history at the Wankhede Stadium. A day earlier at the same venue, had USA’s Shubham Ranjane held on to the return catch from India captain Suryakumar Yadav, when the batter was on 15, it could have been a different story. On the same day in Colombo, the Netherlands had Pakistan under pressure throughout the match, and if Max O’Dowd had caught Faheem Ashraf’s straightforward chance at long-on, it could have been a different story.
On the cricketing field, the gap certainly looks closer, but is it really the case?Go Beyond The Boundary with our YouTube channel. SUBSCRIBE NOW!“The World Cup is every two years now and so we’re playing a lot more competitive cricket, which is obviously closing the gap. It can still be more,” Namibia head coach Craig Williams said while talking to TimesofIndia.com at the Arun Jaitley Stadium, where they will open their campaign against the Netherlands on Tuesday.
Namibia cricket team last played a competitive match four months ago. (Cricket Namibia | Instagram)
“I mean, if you think we played South Africa, which was four months ago, we haven’t had a competitive match since we played Afghanistan in the warm-up. India and these other teams have probably played 30 matches,” he said.Namibia’s captain Gerhard Erasmus has also echoed the same sentiments.“(We) urge the ICC to just give us more games like that (against full member teams), that exposure will level the teams. And I think if the exposure levels the teams and the skill sets of more countries across the world at the same level, we’ll have a global game that’s very strong and I think that will benefit everyone,” he said.The points highlighted by Williams and Erasmus are true.
Namibia captain Gerhard Erasmus
The USA did not play a single T20I against a full member country since the end of the 2024 T20 World Cup, where they had defeated Pakistan, before locking horns against India on Saturday. Nepal played a three-match T20I series against West Indies and emerged victorious 2-1. That was their only assignment against a full member team between the 2024 T20 World Cup and the 2026 T20 World Cup. Namibia faced South Africa in a one-off T20I match in October 2025 and won, apart from facing Zimbabwe in the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup Africa Region Final.
Moving in the right direction
Namibia have qualified for their fourth straight T20 World Cup.Unlike many other Associate nations, where players also have to do odd jobs for a living, Namibia have given central contracts to their players. “We have given full-time contracts to around 20 to 25 players. We’re trying to increase that. We’re always trying to increase our pool of players,” said the Namibia head coach.Namibia had their first international cricket ground last year and Williams, perhaps hoping against hope, said that the new stadium might attract some full member teams to come to his country. “With the home venue now, we can hopefully generate more fixtures, more pressure games for ourselves, invite more countries to come and join Namibia and play against us and then hopefully that’ll make us a better team,” Williams said after his team’s practice session on Sunday.
Gerhard Erasmus of Namibia celebrates taking the wicket of Michael Jones of Scotland during the ICC Men’s T20 Cricket World Cup West Indies & USA 2024 match between Namibia and Scotland at Kensington Oval on June 06, 2024 in Bridgetown, Barbados. (Photo by Gareth Copley/Getty Images)
The expansion of the T20 World Cup to 20 teams and the tournament’s two-year cycle have clearly helped Associate teams play more often against full members and narrow the gap. But, as Namibia’s head coach and captain point out, for that progress to hold and for the gap to get narrower, regular cricket against full members outside marquee events matters just as much.“I mean, the gap has closed. I think the associate teams or the next in line have become a lot more professional. You’ll see big sponsors on the shirts. There’s a lot more money that’s been up for grabs. So, especially in Namibia, we’ve put a lot of money into our high-performance programme and into our junior cricket. So every single year, I definitely think that gap is closing. The big mission for us is to try and compete with the Test nations,” said Williams.
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Namibia are set to open their T20 World Cup campaign on Tuesday against the Netherlands. The Gerhard Erasmus-led side sealed their place at the tournament after a commanding run at the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup 2026 Africa Qualifier in Harare, finishing as unbeaten Group A toppers and backing it up with a dominant semi-final victory over Tanzania.
