Vijay Hazare Trophy to take place from February 20-March 14
India's domestic One-Day competition, the Vijay Hazare Trophy, will take place from February 20 to March 14. The league phase is set to run from February 20 till March 1. Meanwhile, the knockouts will begin with the quarter-finals on March 8 and 9. Both the semi-finals will take place on March 11, with the final on March 14. Here is more.
The teams have been split into six groups, Elite A, B, C, D and E and the Plate Group. The games of Elite Groups will be held in in Surat, Indore, Bangalore, Jaipur and Kolkata respectively. Meanwhile, the Plate Group's games will be held across different locations in Tamil Nadu. The Elite groups comprise six teams each, while the Plate Group has eight teams.
Vijay Hazare Trophy defending champions Karnataka have a spot in Group C. They defeated Tamil Nadu by 60 runs in the final. Meanwhile, runners-up Tamil Nadu, who recently won the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy, are in Group B. Notably, they were crowned champions of the Vijay Hazare Trophy in the 2017 edition. Former champions Delhi and Mumbai are both in Group D.
Here are the teams included in Elite Group A, B, C and D. Elite A: Gujarat, Chhattisgarh, Hyderabad, Tripura, Baroda, Goa. Venue: Surat. Elite B: Tamil Nadu, Punjab, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Vidarbha, Andhra Pradesh. Venue: Indore. Elite C: Karnataka, Uttar Pradesh, Kerala, Odisha, Railways, Bihar. Venue: Bangalore. Elite D: Delhi, Mumbai, Maharashtra, Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan, Pondicherry. Venue: Jaipur.
Elite E: Bengal, Services, Jammu & Kashmir, Saurashtra, Haryana, Chandigarh. Venue: Kolkata. Plate Group: Uttarakhand, Assam, Nagaland, Meghalaya, Manipur, Arunachal Pradesh, Mizoram, Sikkim. Venue: Tamil Nadu.
As per the BCCI's COVID-19 protocols, the teams will assemble in their respective cities a week before the start of the tournament, on February 13. They will then need to undergo COVID-19 testing procedures and quarantine according to the regulations of state and BCCI's own process. This includes three COVID tests (February 13, 15 and 17), with training allowed on February 18 and 19.
