The Ranji Trophy will begin on October 11 when the BCCI announces 1,788 home matches

The BCCI on Wednesday unveiled a massive domestic calendar for the 2026-27 season with a staggering 1,788 matches scheduled in men’s and women’s cricket, including the senior, U-23, U-19 and U-16 categories. The season will begin with the Duleep Trophy on August 23 and will continue until March 2027, underscoring the board’s continued emphasis on strengthening India’s domestic structure.

The upcoming season will feature several structural improvements and schedule changes, including the return of the Col. CK Nayudu Trophy Winners Vs. Rest of India, conversion of selected U-23 tournaments to T20 competitions and neutral knockout venues for the Cooch Behar Trophy.

The BCCI said the calendar was designed to ensure a “balanced progression across formats and categories”, while continuing to favor red-ball cricket.

The red ball season will once again kick off with the zonal Duleep Trophy to be played at the Center of Excellence from August 23 to September 10 ahead of the Irani Cup scheduled from October 1 to 5 in Srinagar/Jammu.

RANJI TROPHY FROM OCTOBER 11

The Ranji Trophy will continue in its split phase, with the league phase starting on October 11 and continuing in January after the white-ball block. The knockouts are scheduled from February 9th to March 3rd. The format remains unchanged, with the 32 teams divided into four elite groups of eight teams each, with six teams competing in the Plate division. The top two teams from each elite group qualify directly for the quarter-finals.

Defending champions Jammu and Kashmir headline Elite Group A along with Madhya Pradesh, Vidarbha and Uttar Pradesh, while Karnataka, Andhra and Saurashtra form part of the competitive Elite Group B. Bengal, Maharashtra and Kerala are grouped in Elite C, while Mumbai, Haryana, Tamil Nadu and Rajasthan are part of Elite D.

One notable addition to the calendar is the resumption of the Col. CK Nayudu Trophy Winners Vs. rest of India to be played from October 1-4 in Chennai under TNCA. The fixture returns after a long absence and is aimed at giving more exposure to budding U-23 cricketers.

In a major white-ball development, the Men’s U-23 State A Trophy and the Vizzy Trophy were both converted from one-day tournaments to T20 competitions, reflecting the board’s efforts to align domestic cricket with the changing demands of the modern game.

SIGNIFICANT EVENTS WITH THE WHITE MILE

The Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy, India’s premier domestic T20 competition, will run from November 14 to December 6. Mumbai, Visakhapatnam, Kolkata and Mohali will host the league stage while Nagpur has been allotted the knockout matches.

The format of the tournament maintains the recently introduced Super League phase. The top two teams from each of the four elite groups advance to the two Super League groups, with those leading the group competing for the final. Jharkhand, Rajasthan, Bengal and Karnataka headline Elite Group A, while Haryana, Punjab, Delhi and Tamil Nadu are grouped in Elite B. Andhra, Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra feature in Elite C, with Hyderabad, Mumbai, Gujarat and Vidarbha forming a strong Elite D line-up.

The Vijay Hazare Trophy will be played from December 14 to January 8, with Ahmedabad, Bengaluru, Ranchi and Rajkot hosting the league stage and Visakhapatnam being the knockout stage. Vidarbha, Madhya Pradesh and Tamil Nadu are placed in Elite Group A, while Saurashtra, Mumbai and Gujarat are in Group B. Punjab, Delhi and Maharashtra form the core of Elite C, while Karnataka, Uttar Pradesh, Kerala and Bengal headline Elite D.

The BCCI has also implemented a scheduling adjustment for junior cricket by moving the Vijay Merchant Trophy (U-16) to the November-January period in a bid to improve player preparation and streamline the calendar.

Another major change concerns the knockouts of the Cooch Behar Trophy. The knockout stages of the U-19 red-ball competition are traditionally played at home stadiums and will now be held exclusively in Bengaluru and Mysuru. The BCCI said the move is to ensure a more level playing field during the January knockout phase, when regional weather differences often become a factor.

WOMEN’S CRICKET SCHEDULE

Women’s domestic cricket will once again occupy a significant chunk of the calendar. The Senior Women’s T20 Trophy is scheduled from October 26 to November 20, with Lucknow, Pune, Delhi and Mohali hosting the league matches while Ahmedabad will host the knockouts.

The Senior Women’s One-Day Trophy will run from December 19 to January 10 across Cuttack, Jaipur, Baroda and Raipur, with Chennai hosting the knockouts.

The women’s inter-zonal structure also remains intact, with T20, one-day and multi-day competitions comprising six zonal teams – Central, South, North, East, West and North-East zones.

At the junior level, the Women’s U-19 T20 Trophy will be held from October 9 to 26, while the Women’s U-19 Challenger Trophy is scheduled for Dharamshala from October 30 to November 5.

The BCCI has retained a system of promotion and relegation across formats, with the winners of the Plate group gaining promotion and the bottom-placed elite side facing relegation for the following season. Rankings in multi-day tournaments will continue to be determined using points, bonus points, wins, head-to-head record and quotient, while white-ball competitions will use points, wins and clean runs as the primary criteria.

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Issued by:

Akshay Ramesh

Published on:

20 May 2026 18:30 IST