Namibia cricket team captain Gerhard Erasmus has questioned why his team did not get a night training session ahead of their under-lights ICC Men’s T20 World Cup 2026 clash against defending champions India today at the Arun Jaitley Stadium in Delhi.
“Yeah, we haven’t had a night training (session) before this game, I don’t know why. I think India have two night training (sessions) and I can see outside that Canada will have a night training now, so make of it what you want, but we’re just going to rock up and do our Namibian way, which is to fight,” Erasmus said.
Namibia played a day match against the Netherlands on Monday and then trained in daylight for the following two days, he said, while India trained twice at night in the run-up to the match.
The question became more relevant as Erasmus and his teammates, just as Namibia prepared to leave, saw Canada begin training alongside India in a night session at the same venue despite Canada having an afternoon match against the UAE on Friday.
Erasmus said the issue was important because Namibia have limited experience playing under lights, as they do not have floodlights at home and do not compete in many night or day-night matches.
“We don’t have any (flood) light in Namibia… the day/night games. Infrastructure wise that’s probably the challenge for us so yeah, it’s not a casual thing for guys who don’t have (experience)…” he said.
“I think apart from the guys who played in the Nepal Premier League and the ILT20 and the World Cups that we’ve played, you don’t really get used to the lights and training under that very often,” added Erasmus.
The ICC said Namibia’s request for a training session under lights had come too late.
“All teams were provided with training schedules well in advance of the tournament – January 27 – and requests to change times were accommodated where possible,” a spokesman said.
“However, Namibia’s request did not come until the previous night (February 10) – too late for us to adjust the schedule,” they added.
Namibia qualified for the tournament after winning the Africa qualifier in Harare, but began their campaign with a defeat against the Netherlands. They face the United States national cricket team and the Pakistan cricket team in their remaining group matches, both of which are scheduled to start at 3 p.m.
