World Super 8's announced

The WACA ground at Perth will host an international Super 8's tournament in October 1998. Invitations have been issued to all nine current Test-playing nations to compete.

The Australian Cricket Board announced yesterday that the Western Australian Cricket Association had been chosen as the host of the inaugural World Super 8's Championship, and have secured the rights to host the tournament annually for the next five years. All matches will be played at the WACA ground in Perth.

Perth won the rights to stage the annual tournament following bids from a number of Australian state capitals. The successful bid was backed by EventsCorp, the Western Australian government body responsible for attracting major sporting and entertainment events to Perth. The WACA have appointed former Australian fast bowler Dennis Lillee as tournament director.

The tournament will be played over three days, likely to be 2-4 October 1998. Matches last approximately two hours each. With nine nations expected to compete, there would be four round-robin matches on each of the first two days, plus semi-finals and final on the last day (a Sunday). The series is being offered for sale to television networks internationally. The weekend in question falls three weeks before the commencement of the ICC Knockout in Bangladesh (24-31 October), but is likely to clash with Australia's Test tour of Pakistan. It comes one week after the Hong Kong Max weekend (26-27 September, replacing the former Hong Kong Sixes).

Total prizemoney for the tournament will be $500,000 Australian (approx $US 325,000), with the winning team receiving $400,000 Australian.

Super 8 is a variation of cricket developed within the Australian Cricket Board as a modified version of the game "relevant to all levels of the sport". The ACB were responsible for organising two international Super 8 tournaments in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia in July 1996 and August 1997. A three-week series involving all six Australian states and held in mid-winter of the 1996 off-season in the Queensland centres of Cairns, Townsville and Brisbane incurred a loss of over a million dollars and failed to be converted to an annual event.

In announcing this event, Lillee described Super 8's as the "third generation" of cricket following Test/first-class cricket and one-day matches.

Related Links on CricInfo:

• 1996 International Super 8's in Malaysia
• 1997 International Super 8's in Malaysia
• summary of rule differences