Pakistan knocked out of T20 WC; semifinal and final to be held in India
Pakistan became the third team after Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe to be officially knocked out of ICC T20 World Cup 2026 Super 8 round
Pakistan’s dream of winning their second T20 World Cup trophy came crashing down on Saturday after they failed to beat Sri Lanka by the required margin of 65 runs in their final Super 8 match at Pallekele International Cricket Stadium in Pallekele.
Pakistan needed to beat Sri Lanka by 65 runs and they gave themselves a strong chance after scoring 212 runs batting first. But Sri Lanka went past the required 148-run mark on the fifth ball of the 16th over to knock Pakistan out of the tournament.
New Zealand has now become the second team from Group 2, alongside England, to qualify for the semifinals.
Pakistan getting knocked out also means that now both the semifinals and the final of the T20 World Cup 2026 will be played in India and not in Sri Lanka.
Why have the semifinal and final been held in Sri Lanka?
One semifinal and the final match of the ICC T20 World Cup 2026 would have been held in Sri Lanka if Pakistan had qualified for those matches as part of an arrangement made between Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB),Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) and International Cricket Council (ICC) before the start of the tournament.
According to the arrangement, neither side will travel to each other’s country even for an ICC event and any match involving them will be played at a neutral venue. The deal was made after India refused to travel to Pakistan for the ICC Champions Trophy 2025 and played all their matches in the UAE due to security concerns.
Similarly, had Pakistan qualified for the semifinal or final of the 2026 T20 World Cup, both the matches involving them would have been played in Sri Lanka even if India had qualified.
What will be the venues of semifinals and final now?
The second semi-final of the tournament will be held at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai as scheduled, but with Pakistan out of the picture the first semifinal match will now be played at Eden Gardens in Kolkata instead of the R Premadasa Stadium in Colombo.
The final match will also now go as per the schedule and will be held at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad on Sunday, March 8. It would have been shifted to Colombo had Pakistan qualified.
What will happen to ticket holders of first semifinal match?
The ICC had released the tickets for the semifinal matches on Tuesday, with semifinal 1 still scheduled to be played in Sri Lanka. But now since semifinal 1 will take place in Kolkata, the ICC will refund any tickets sold and will release a fresh set of tickets in accordance with the new venue.