Top baseball officials from Japan, the United States and South Korea reached a basic agreement Friday to hold the inaugural Super World Cup in March 2006, Japanese baseball officials said.
Japanese commissioner Yasuchika Negoro, Bob DuPuy, president and chief operating officer of Major League Baseball, and Park Yong Oh, commissioner of the Korean Baseball Organization, agreed on the plan in a meeting in Tokyo, the officials said.
Working-level talks will be held in New York in December to work on details of the tournament, which features top professionals, with an official announcement expected to be made next spring, they said.
MLB earlier proposed to hold the inaugural World Cup next March featuring 16 countries, but the proposal met opposition from Japan and South Korea, which wanted a greater say in organizing the tournament.
MLB later relented and agreed to set up an organizing committee and let Japan play a leadership role in the tournament's Asia round.
The three countries also reaffirmed that they will step up cooperation in order to keep baseball in the Olympic program.