Preparing in a pandemic: PNG cricketers full steam ahead for World Cup debut

It's almost two years since Papua New Guinea made history by qualifying for the Men's T20 Cricket World Cup.

The Barramundis were meant to make their debut in the big time in October last year in Australia until Covid-19 intervened.

Their maiden appearance was rerouted to India later this year before the ICC announced the tournament would be shifted to the United Arab Emirates and Oman because of the worsening Covid situation in the country.

So is this tournament history in the making or will Papua New Guinea's World Cup debut be consigned to history?

Cricket PNG Chief Executive Greg Campbell said that was the million dollar question.

"The ICC are adamant it's going to happen. All the plans are in place for us to go hopefully on the 29th of August to fly to Oman and play a series of warm-up games before we go into Cricket League World Two and then onto the World Cup."

Papua New Guinea has it's own Covid challenges which have hampered the squad's preparations on home soil, with just over 80,000 people having had at least one dose of vaccine from a population of close to nine million.

Greg Campbell, who has been based in Brisbane since April, said the Barramundis players were all fully vaccinated and had made a conscious decision to protect them and their loved ones.

"Everyone's done. All the managers, Carl, myself, all the players put the hand up straight away - they got their second vaccination three to four weeks ago," he said.

" All the women have been done, most of our staff have been done. We're talking with the Under 19s because they'll going to a World Cup in January/February...the players come forward for that and most of the teams we're going to play have been done too, so everyone in the World Cup would have been vaccinated as far as I know."

The Barramundis squad is currently competing in a slimmed down T20 Bash in Port Moresby, after Covid-19 protocols had disrupted much of their domestic season.

National head coach Carl Sandri has been forced to follow the matches online from Melbourne, where is currently in lockdown. The former Italy international was appointed in April and is looking forward to finally meeting the team in the flesh.

"Just talking to the boys a lot via Whats App and Zoom I think as the countdown becomes real now for me I'm just really keen to get on the ground and do what you do as a coach - get on the ground, be on the beat with them and training every day and that's really the exciting part that's now starting to bubble away.'

The Barramundis have a busy schedule in the month leading into the World Cup, with an ODI series against the UAE and Nepal, Cricket World Cup qualifiers against Oman and Scotland, before a host of T20 games against Ireland, Sri Lanka, Namibia and Scotland.

"That's giving us 10-15 games of quality opposition - international games - so that's going to put us straight into that environment where it's go time," Sandri explained.

"I think we've done a lot of preparation and domestic games and so forth, so it's good to have us getting straight into meaningful games that count for rankings and we can learn that way too."

The Barramundis face Oman, Scotland and Bangladesh in the First Round of the T20 World Cup, with the top two teams in the group advancing to the main draw or "Super 12".

With Oman competing in their first World Cup on home soil and Bangladesh fresh from a series win over Australia, Carl Sandri acknowledged it won't be easy but he backed his players to cause an upset.

"In every World Cup or Olympics there's always a story to come out of it or an underdog or a narrative that someone would knock over a full member or someone will get further along in the tournament than expected and I say why not us?

"Why can't we be the ones to make it through or shock a full member or be the story of the World Cup."