As a result, the two competitions, men’s and women’s, will launch in the summer of 2027-28, with a one-season continuation of the current Super Smash structure to take NZ20’s place for the time being.

Official confirmation from NZC is expected later today.

In particular, sources have told the Herald that difficulty in clearing space in the New Zealand cricket calendar has been a considerable obstacle.

As first reported by the Herald, an all-format tour of New Zealand by Sri Lanka has left little space in the proposed January 2027 window. The Black Caps then travel to Pakistan while Sri Lanka host South Africa at the same time, meaning the tour of New Zealand cannot be pushed back to a later date either, unless fixtures are postponed or cancelled.

While a January 2027 launch for the men’s competition was the intention of both NZC and the NZ20 Establishment Committee, the race to gain a licence, sell the league and teams to investors before finalising locations and squads was always going to be a huge ask.

However, the Herald also understands the league has seen huge interest from investors, and will likely see a tender process to finalise NZ20’s owners.

Speaking to the Herald in March after NZ20’s confirmation as the preferred option, Organising Committee chair Don Mackinnon made no bones of the difficulties faced, but signposted a 2027-28 launch was also a contingency.

“[Time constraints] are tight, there’s no doubt about that. We’d hoped to be at this point two or three months ago,” he said.

“There may be the odd compromise in year one. Also, too, New Zealand Cricket are working through their own scheduling challenges that need to be solved. So we very much have a back-up of December ‘27 for our women and January ‘28 [for the men].

“If we have to go there, we will, but at the moment, we’re going to do everything we can to kick this off in January 2027.”

Alex Powell is a sports journalist for the NZ Herald. He has been a sports journalist since 2016.