The first phase of the Ranji Trophy will take place from February 10 to March 15 before the premier domestic event takes a break during the IPL and resumes from May 30 to June 26 for the knockouts, BCCI secretary Jay Shah informed state units on Thursday.
The tournament will have 64 games in 62 days with the first phase comprising 57 matches and the second stage having seven knock-out games which comprises four quarter-finals, two semi-finals and the final. Sixty five matches will be played across nine venues, Kolkata, Chennai, Rajkot, Delhi, Ahmedabad, Guwahati, Cuttack, Trivandrum, and Haryana.
Jay Shah has made it clear that it will be one of the shortest first-class seasons in which most of the team will get to play just three matches. This means that the team that is out of the group league stage will not get much benefit from the increased match fee.
Besides the playing conditions, Shah informed that the detailed match schedule will “soon” be communicated along with COVID-19 guidelines. The BCCI has confirmed that the teams will have to enter their respective bio secure hub on February 10 and the first phase of the tournament will be ove