All about ICC Champions Trophy 2006

The fifth ICC Champions Trophy is going to be held in India from 7^th of October 2006. Ahead of this second most important tournament to world cup in one day international cricket, fans are waiting with extreme joys to be able to see all the elite members of the ICC Test family playing in the same tournament. Though there was a suspicion regarding this tournament beforehand due to the rejection of Indian Government not to allow BCCI (the regulatory body of Indian cricket) to pay any tax on the revenue of this tournament as BCCI bosses thought this tournaments to be unprofitable thinking the duration and huge budget of this tournament, but at the end of the day, the victory is for cricket as Indian government allowed BCCI not to pay any tax on the revenue of this tournament.

Today I searched on the upcoming ICC Champions Trophy and found some important news and information which may meet with your curiosity. Now, I am going to give an overview of this tournament including various aspects. If you find anything to be included in this article, please let me know in the comment section.

History

ICC Champions Trophy was first introduced in 1998 as the ICC Knockout Tournaments at Dhaka, Bangladesh. The principle objective of ICC behind such a tournament was to increase the fund of the ICC to spend the money in their development program. The first two championships were held in Bangladesh and Kenya in 1998 and 2000 respectively. Those of the first two tournaments took place in the form of a knock out tournament where after every match the winning team went to the next round and the losing team was eliminated. There was no second chance for the losing teams to go to the next round. This phenomenon of the tournaments, to many, was not effective to make the tournament competitive. Then in 2002, at the third tournaments, ICC went through some changes by introducing the round robin league system for the first time in this tournaments and the name of this tournament was turned into a new name, ‘ICC Champions Trophy’. This tournament is also known as the ‘mini world cup’ to symbolize the importance of this tournament just after the world cup.

Image Link: Wikipedia

Previous Tournaments

ICC Champions Trophy has seen four of its exciting tournaments. After starting from Dhaka in 1998, the tournament took for in Kenya, Sri Lanka and England in 2000, 2002 and 2004 respectively.

1998 in Bangladesh

In the first tournament held in Dhaka, Bangladesh, it was an experience of the combination of excitement and a bit of worry as it was the first example of this kind incorporating all the 9 of the then test playing nations. South Africa has been a part of the history becoming the first champion of this tournament in the way of defeating the West Indies 4 wickets in the final.

Image Link: ICC Champions Trophy Official Website

2000 in Kenya

The second version of this tournament was more exciting. West Indies, the finalist of the previous tournament, could not earn the ticket for the quarter final loosing to Sri Lanka in the pre-quarterfinal match. The excitement was carried to the exciting final too. New Zealand defeated the favorite India in a close final by 4 wickets. The unbeaten century from the great all-rounder Chris Cairns led New Zealand to their first major championship victory.

2002 in Sri Lanka

In this tournament, ICC implemented a new format in which 12 teams played dividing into four groups of three and from each of the group the leading team went to the semi-final round. Though the tournament was going well and the organizers were successfully organize all of the matches, the nature became a hurdle in the final as rain washed out the match and that is why, India and Sri Lanka had to share the cup after being declared both of them as the champion.

2004 in England

The fourth tournament has seen something from the golden times of West Indies as it was their first major championship victory since 1979 while they won the world cup. 12 teams participated in the tournament. Besides, the ten test playing nations, two non-test playing nations Kenya and USA took part in the tournament. West Indies defeated England in a very close match by two wickets.

Image Link: ICC Champions Trophy Official Website

New Format

ICC introduced a new format partially changing the previous one. In 2006, the number of participating countries is 10 meaning only the test playing nations will compete in the tournament. However, 8 teams will be allowed to take part in the main tournament. From these 8 teams 6 were selected from automatically by using the LG ICC ODI ranking on the April 1, 2006. Other four teams of the ranking will play in the preliminary round based on the round robin league system. Then two of the leading teams will join with the other six teams. These eight teams will constitute two pools of 4 and in each pool, teams will compete with each other on the basis of round robin league. From each pool two of the leading teams will go to the semi-final round.

Fixture of the tournament

The fixture of the tournament is as follows

Pool A: Australia, England, India, Qualifier 2

Pool B: South Africa, Pakistan, New Zealand, Qualifier 1

Qualifying Teams: Sri Lanka, West Indies, Bangladesh, Zimbabwe

Preliminary Round

Date Participating Teams Venue

Oct 7 Sri Lanka v Bangladesh Mohali

Oct 8 West Indies v Zimbabwe Ahmedabad

Oct 10 Sri Lanka v Zimbabwe Ahmedabad

Oct 11 West Indies v Bangladesh Jaipur

Oct 13 Bangladesh v Zimbabwe Jaipur

Oct 14 Sri Lanka v West Indies Mumbai

Main Round

Oct 15 India v England Jaipur

Oct 16 New Zealand v South Africa Mumbai

Oct 17 Pakistan v Qualifier 1 Jaipur

Oct 18 Australia v Qualifier 2 Mumbai

Oct 20 New Zealand v Qualifier 1 Mumbai

Oct 21 Australia v England Jaipur

Oct 24 South Africa v Qualifier 1 Ahmedabad

Oct 25 New Zealand v Pakistan Mohali

Oct 26 India v Qualifier 2 Ahmedabad

Oct 27 Pakistan v South Africa Mohali

Oct 28 England v Qualifier 2 Ahmedabad

Oct 29 India v Australia Mumbai

Semi-Finals

Nov 1 First Semi-final Mohali

Nov 2 Second Semi-final Jaipur

Final

Nov 5 The winners of Semi-finals Mumbai

Stadiums

ICC Champions trophy will be held in four venues locate at Mohali, Ahmedabad, jaipur and Mumbai. All the stadiums have the floodlight system. Information regarding the stadiums is given below:

Sawai Mansingh Stadium, Jaipur

This stadium is in the Rajasthan province of India. In this stadium, 6 matches of this tournament will be held. Its capacity is about 40,000. It was debuted as a test venue in 1987 and first ODI was held here in 1983.

Punjab Cricket Association Stadium, Mohali

Located in the Punjab province, this stadium is very popular among the stadiums of India. Its seating capacity is 20,000. Though this is the youngest test cricket venue in India, it is the largest cricket venue in India. In 1994 it was introduced as a test venue. Here, 5 matches including a semi-final will be held. It has flood light system.

Sardar Patel Stadium, Ahmedabad

It is situated in the Gujarat province. The stadium stands on the banks of Sabarmati River. First test match was held here in 1983 and this stadium is also known as Motera. The stadium has a capacity of 8,000. Flood light is also available in this stadium.

Brabourne Stadium, Mumbai

This stadium is located in the Mumbai province in India. This stadium was first introduced as a test venue in 1948 and in 1989 it became an ODI venue too. 5 matches including the final will be held in this ground. The stadium is very important for its location. The offices of the BCCI is situated is also situated here. It has 20,000 capacities. Many important matches of the history have been played in this stadium.

Teams

Twelve teams will be participated in the tournament. Each team has declared their 14 members squad. The squads of the participating countries are given below:

Australia

RT Ponting (captain), NW Bracken, SR Clark, MJ Clarke, AC Gilchrist (wicketkeeper), GB Hogg, MEK Hussey, MG Johnson, SM Katich, B Lee, GD McGrath, DR Martyn, A Symonds, SR Watson

Bangladesh

Habibul Bashar (captain), Shahriar Nafees (vice-captain), Abdur Razzak, Aftab Ahmed, Farhad Reza, Khaled Mashud (wicketkeeper), Mashrafe Mortaza, Mehrab Hossain jnr, Mohammad Ashraful, Mohammad Rafique, Rajin Saleh, Saqibul Hasan, Shahadat Hossain, Syed Rasel

England

A Flintoff (captain), JM Anderson, IR Bell, R Clarke, PD Collingwood, JWM Dalrymple, SJ Harmison, EC Joyce, J Lewis, SI Mahmood, KP Pietersen, CMW Read (wicketkeeper), AJ Strauss, MH Yardy

India

R Dravid (captain), AB Agarkar, MS Dhoni (wicketkeeper), Harbhajan Singh, M Kaif, D Mongia, MM Patel, IK Pathan, RR Powar, SK Raina, V Sehwag, RP Singh, SR Tendulkar, Yuvraj Singh

New Zealand

SP Fleming (captain), NJ Astle, SE Bond, JEC Franklin, PG Fulton, MR Gillespie, BB McCullum (wicketkeeper), HJH Marshall, KD Mills, JDP Oram, JS Patel, SB Styris, DL Vettori, L Vincent

Pakistan

Inzamam-ul-Haq (captain), Abdul Razzaq, Iftikhar Anjum, Imran Farhat, Kamran Akmal (wicketkeeper), Mohammad Asif, Mohammad Hafeez, Mohammad Yousuf, Naved-ul-Hasan, Shahid Afridi, Shoaib Akhtar, Shoaib Malik, Umar Gul, Younis Khan

Sri Lanka

DPMD Jayawardene (captain), MS Atapattu, CM Bandara, TM Dilshan, CRD Fernando, ST Jayasuriya, CK Kapugedera, MF Maharoof, SL Malinga, M Muralitharan, PDRL Perera, KC Sangakkara (wicketkeeper), WU Tharanga, WPUJC Vaas

South Africa

GC Smith (captain), JH Kallis (vice-captain), LL Bosman, MV Boucher (wicketkeeper), AB de Villiers, HH Dippenaar, HH Gibbs, AJ Hall, JM Kemp, CK Langeveldt, A Nel, M Ntini, RJ Peterson, SM Pollock

West Indies

BC Lara (captain), RR Sarwan (vice-captain), CS Baugh (wkt-keeper), IDR Bradshaw, DJ Bravo, S Chanderpaul, CD Collymore, FH Edwards, CH Gayle, WW Hinds, RS Morton, MN Samuels, DR Smith, JE Taylor

Zimbabwe

P Utseya (captain), CJ Chibhabha, E Chigumbura, T Duffin, AJ Ireland, Mamungozi T, H Masakadza, Matsikenyeri S, T Mupariwa, Rainsford EC, HP Rinke, V Sibanda, GM Strydom, BRM Taylor (wicketkeeper)

Sponsors

The official global partners of this tournament are LG Electronics, Pepsi, Hutch, Hero Honda and the official sponsors are IndianOil, Cable and Wireless, Visa card and Standard Chartered.

TV Rights

The Sony Entertainment television is the official broadcasters of this tournament. Besides, there are many other broadcasters who will equally broadcast or telecast the recent news regarding Champions Trophy.

Ticket

The organizers of the tournament have taken a praiseworthy initiative giving an option of online ticket booking to the fans. People can go through the given website for ticket booking and they will find all of the information regarding different class of tickets.

Pre- tournament Betting Regarding ICC Champions Trophy

Betting is now similar to a big industry. Fans are used to bet on the occasion of any popular tournament. Though in some cases betting is not inspired, it is going on in its way and people are interested to know about the recent result of the betting on the occasion of a tournament. It is seen that Australia holds its top position in the betting market too ahead of the ICC Champions Trophy. Then India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and South Africa follow for the successive position.