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Parent page: The Teams of the World Cup
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The ICC World Cup is technically open to all ICC member countries, but the qualification process makes it significantly easier for full members of the Council to progress to the World Cup tournament.
However, after the initial 1975 World Cup hosted in London, many new teams have made their appearances. Read here which teams have been participating in the tournament in its nearly half a decade of history.
Oldest Participating Countries
The original 1975 tournament was played between England, Australia, East Africa, India, New Zealand, Pakistan, West Indies, and Sri Lanka. Apart from the East African team, which represented Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, and Zambia, and only ever participated once, and the original seven teams have participated in every single World Cup.
Since the first cup tournament, new teams have participated with regularity. Canada and Zimbabwe made their first appearances early on, Canada in 1979 and Zimbabwe in 1983. While Canada has had limited success and qualified only for four cups since, Zimbabwe has been a standard participant. It had a stake in nine tournaments, failing to qualify only once since.
The New Favourites
In the 1990s, each tournament saw new participant teams. South Africa, Kenya, Netherlands, United Arab Emirates, Bangladesh, and Scotland all had their debut tournaments.
Many of these teams became cup staples, for instance, South Africa having participated in eight cups, and Bangladesh and Kenya having several participations under their belt as well. UAE failed to make waves, only having qualified twice.
The newbies
After the 1990s, the pace of introducing new players slowed down significantly. Since 2003, only Namibia, Bermuda, Ireland, and Afghanistan have had their first-ever cup participation.
Namibia and Bermuda turned out to be one-hit wonders and did not qualify again. The other entrants Scotland, Ireland, and Afghanistan, have made more of a mark, having participated two or three times each since then.