The Major League Cricket (MLC) has been granted official List A status by the ICC, making it an officially recognized T20 league. The league, which is based in the USA, is planning to expand from six teams to 10 in the coming seasons. The 2024 season will start on July 5, a week after the T20 World Cup ends. 

Major League Cricket (MLC), the season-old T20 tournament in the USA, has become the second Associate-run franchise competition to acquire List A status from the ICC, following on from the UAE’s ILT20 earlier this year.

The status means that MLC will now be recognised as an official T20 league, with tournament playing records now counted as official format statistics. The league is also planning to expand from the current six teams to 10 in the coming seasons.

The 2024 edition of MLC will start on July 5, a week after the T20 World Cup ends on June 29 in Bridgetown. The T20 World Cup begins, however, in Dallas, USA on June 1, in what is an important season in the game’s continuing efforts to crack the US market.

The Guardian, which reported on the awarding of List A status on Monday, also revealed MLC’s plans to expand from the current six teams to 10 over the next few years, jumping from 19 games in 2023 to 34 by 2025. Twenty-five games have already been scheduled for this season.

MLC’s chief executive, Vijay Srinivasan, stated that the league wants to start in early June in 2025, avoiding a clash with the Hundred’s July-August window. The first season ran from July 13 to 31 with 15 group-stage games followed by four playoff matches, and ended with MI New York lifting the trophy under the captaincy of Nicholas Pooran. The second season will be played across the same two grounds which hosted the first season – the Grand Prairie Stadium in Texas and the Church Street Park Stadium in Morrisville.