RANJI TROPHY 2024-25 FAQ
Follow UsThe Ranji Trophy, India’s premier domestic First-Class tournament is back and the 2024-25 season is going to be its 90th edition. Several changes have been made to the red-ball tournament ahead of the new season. But the format is not one of them.
So, what’s the format?
A total of 38 teams representing various states and sometimes just regions within the same state (Yes, Maharashtra have three teams–Mumbai, Maharashtra and Vidarbha and so do Gujarat–Baroda, Saurashtra and Gujarat), will be part of the competition.
The competition is formed of two tiers, the Elite and the Plate. Elite has 32 teams divided into four groups of eight each. It is these teams that compete for the Ranji Trophy.
How does the relegation and promotion system work in the Ranji Trophy?
So, to understand this system. Let us complete our format part first. 32 teams in Elite, divided into four groups. In every group, each team plays the other once and at the end of the round-robin league, the top two teams in the points table from each group move to the quarter-final.
Subsequently, the next four move to the semis and then finally two teams compete for the bragging rights.
In the Plate division, six teams play against each other in a round-robin format. The top four move to the semi-final, with the top two eventually playing the Plate Final. Those who reach the final get promoted to the Elite Division at the expense of two of the Elite Division's worst-performing teams.
The two worst-performing teams will be decided by comparing the points accumulated and net run rate of all the teams in the Elite Division, irrespective of group. This means that the two teams could be from one group or two groups.
Last season, Goa and Manipur were relegated to the Plate Division, while Nagaland and Hyderabad were promoted to the Elite Division.
Who are the teams in the Elite and Plate divisions in Ranji Trophy 2024-25?
You can check out how the various teams are stacked in the Elite and Plate divisions by clicking on this link.
How long will the Ranji Trophy 2024-25 be?
Now that it is clear as to what the format is and who the teams are, it is important to know that the duration of the Ranji Trophy 2024-25 has been extended from the usual three months to six months.
Usually played between January and March, this season of the red-ball tournament will begin in October (11th) and go on till March. However, it has been divided into windows. In the first window, each team will play five league matches.
After the end of the first window on November 13, the gap will be utilised to contest the two major white-ball tournaments of the Indian domestic season- the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy and the Vijay Hazare Trophy.
The Ranji Trophy will return in January with its second window starting from the 23rd of that month. It will run till the end of February when the final will begin on the 26th of that month.
And how many rest days between games?
Shardul Thakur of Mumbai was one of the many players that voiced their opinion on the taxing nature of the Ranji Trophy schedule where the teams had to play each four games within a gap of three rest days.
Heeding the request to increase the rest days so that the players remain fresh in between matches, the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) have now introduced an extra rest day between two matches. Now, teams will have four rest days between every four-day game in the competition.
Who are the defending champions?
Mumbai lifted their 42nd Ranji Trophy title after they beat Vidarbha in the final of the 2023-24 season.
What about the personnel changes?
Just like before every other domestic season, there are changes in personnel before this season as well. While Mandeep Singh moved from Punjab to Tripura, Baba Aparajith shifted base from Tamil Nadu to Kerala.
There are other players who moved from one state to another. You can find out all about the transfers by reading this.
Wasim Jaffer was one of the prominent coaching changes ahead of the Ranji Trophy. He was named as Punjab’s head coach.
Any controversies?
Yes and Bihar. That’s right, just before the start of the Ranji Trophy, Patna High Court needed to intervene to decide which of the two teams selected by the Secretary and the President of the Bihar Cricket Association (BICA) will represent the state in the premier domestic tournament.
It sounds like you've heard it before, right? Well, the only difference is that last time, the two teams reached the gate of the Moin-ul-Haq Stadium in Patna, where Bihar was scheduled to play their season opener against Mumbai. This time, the problem was solved three days ahead of the start of the tournament.
Full Squads as available on October 9, 2024
Meghalaya: Aryan Borah, Akash Kumar Choudhary, Arpit Bhatewara, Bamanbha Shangpliang, Bijon Dey, Chengkam Sangma, Dippu Sangma, Jaskirat Singh Sachdeva, Kishan Lyngdoh, Ram Gurung, Roshan Warbah, and Swarajeet Das
Maharashtra: Ruturaj Gaikwad (c), Nikhil Naik (wk), Ankeet Bawane, Sachin Dhas, Arshin Kulkarni, Murtaza Trunkwalla, Siddhesh Veer, Mukesh Choudhary, Hitesh Walunj, Pradeep Dadhe, Rajnish Gurbani, Harshal Kate, Prashant Solanki, Satyajeet Bachhav, Mandar Bhandari, Ramakrishna Ghosh, Azim Kazi.
Odisha: Govinda Poddar (c), Shantanu Mishra, Anurag Sarangi, Sandeep Pattanaik, Biplab Samantaray, Kartik Biswal, Swastik Samal, Rajesh Dhupar, Aashirwad Swain (wk), Anil Parida, Suryakant Pradhan, Sunil Kumar Roul, Rajesh Mohanty, Debaprata Pradhan, Tarani Sa, Harshit Rathod, Sumit Sharma.
Andhra: Ricky Bhui (C), Shaikh Rasheed (vc), KS Bharat (wk), Hanuma Vihari, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Maheep Kumar, Vamsi Krishna (wk), Abishek Reddy, KV Sasikanth, Ashwin Hebbar, CH Stephen, Satyanarayana Raju, A Lalith Mohan, G Manish, T Vijay, M Hemanth Reddy
Hyderabad: Tilak Varma (Captain), Rahul Singh G (Vice Captain), CV Milind, Tanmay Agarwal, Rohit Rayudu, Tanay Thyagarajan, Aniketh Reddy, Nitesh Kannala, Abhirath Reddy, Himateja, Rahul Radesh, Rakshann Readdi, Kartikeya Kak, Saranu Nishant, Dheeraj Goud.
Gujarat: Priyank Panchal, Arya Desai, Het Patel, Urvil Patel, Chintan Gaja, Arzan Nagwaswalla, Umang Kumar, Siddharth Desai, Manan Hingrajia, Priyajitsinh Jadeja, Tejas Patel, Jaymeet Patel, Rishi Patel, Rinkesh Vaghela, Vishal Jayswal.
Rajasthan Squad: Deepak Hooda (captain), Abhijeet Tomar, Yash Kothari, Ram Mohan Chauhan, Salman Khan, Mahipal Lomror, Kunal Singh Rathore, Bharat Sharma, Ajay Singh Kookna, Manav Suthar, Rahul Chahar, Deepak Chahar (vice-captain), Aniket Chaudhary, Khalil Ahmed, Arafat Khan
Reserve players: Mohit Jain, Rajkumar Saini, Samarprit Joshi, Rajesh Bishnoi (Jr), Zuber Ali Khan, Rajveer Singh Rathore & Shubham Garhwal.
Madhya Pradesh: Shubham Sharma (c), Yash Dubey, Himanshu Mantri, Shubranshu Senapati, Rajat Patidar, Harpreet Bhatia, Venkatesh Iyer, Harsh Gawali, Kumar Kartikeya, Saransh Jain, Sagar Solanki, Avesh Khan, Kulwant Khejroliya, Anubhav Agarwal, Aryan Pandey.
Karnataka (first 2 rounds): Mayank Agarwal (captain), Nikin Jose, Devdutt Padikkal, R Smaran, Manish Pandey, Shreyas Gopal, Sujay Sateri, Hardik Raj, Vyshak Vijayakumar, Prasidh Krishna, Vasuki Koushik, Luvnith Sisodia, Mohsin Khan, Vidyadhar Patil, Kishan Bedare, Abhilash Shetty.
Kerala (first round): Sachin Baby (c), Rohan Kunnummal, Krishna Prasad, Baba Aparajith, Akshay Chandran, Mohammed Azharuddeen (wk), Salman Nizar, Vathsal Govind, Vishnu Vinod, Jalaj Saxena, Aditya Sarvate, Basil Thampi, Nidheesh MD, KM Asif, Fanoos F.
Bengal: Anustup Majumdar (captain), Abhimanyu Easwaran, Sudip Gharami, Sudip Chatterjee, Wriddhiman Saha, Shahbaz Ahmed, Abishek Porel, Writtick Chatterjee, Avilin Ghosh, Shuvam Dey, Akash Deep, Mukesh Kumar, Suraj Jaiswal, Mohd Kaif, Pradipta Pramanik, Aamir Gani, Yudhajit Guha, Rohit Kumar and Rishav Vivek.
UP Squad: Aryan Juyal (captain, Wk), Swastik Chikara, Priyam Garg, Akshdeep Nath, Nitish Rana, Saurabh Kumar, Ankit Rajpoot, Aaqib Khan, Vipraj Nigam, Yash Dayal, Shivam Sharma, Siddhartha Yadav, Madhav Kaushik, Vijay Kumar, Aaditya Sharma (Wk), Kritagya Singh; Standby: Atal Bihari Rai, Prince Yadav, Abhishek Goswami, Vineet Panwar, Vaibhav Chaudhary and Kartikey Jaiswal
Tamil Nadu (1st round): R. Sai Kishore (Captain), N. Jagadeesan (Vice Captain), B. Indrajith, B. Sai Sudharsan, Vijay Shankar, Pradosh Ranjan Paul, M. Shahrukh Khan, Boopathi Vaishna Kumar, S. Mohamed Ali, C. Andre Siddarth, S. Ajith Ram, S. Lokeshwar, S. Lakshay Jain, Sandeep Warrier, Gurjapneet Singh, M. Mohammed, R. Sonu Yadav, M. Siddharth.
Delhi (first 2 rounds): Himmat Singh (captain), Ayush Badoni, Anuj Rawat (wk), Sanat Sangwan, Dhruv Kaushik, Yash Dhull, Jonty Sidhu, Mayank Rawat, Kshitiz Sharma, Pranav Rajuvanshi (wk), Sumit Mathur, Navdeep Saini, Himanshu Chauhan, Simarjeet Singh*/Divij Mehra, Hrithik Shokeen, Harsh Tyagi, Money Grewal, Shivank Vashisth.
Saurashtra: Jaydev Unadkat (c), Cheteshwar Pujara, Harvik Desai (wk), Sheldon Jackson, Tarang Gohel, Arpit Vasavada, Chirag Jani, Prerak Mankad, Yuvrajsinh Dodiya, D Jadeja, Parth Bhut, Vishvaraj Jadeja, Hiten Kanbi, Navneet Vora, Parswaraj Rana.
Chhattisgarh: Amandeep Khare, Shashank Singh, Bhupen Lalwani, Eknath Kerkar, Ajay Mandal, Shubham Agarwal, Ashutosh Singh, Ayush Pandey, Jivesh Butte, Ashish Chouhan, Sanjeet Desai, Ravi Kiran, Rishabh Tiwari, Anuj Tiwary, Vasudev Bareth, Vishvas Malik.
Jharkhand: Ishan Kishan (capt), Virat Singh (vice-capt), Kumar Kushagra (wk), Nazim Siddique, Aryaman Sen, Sharandeep Singh, Kumar Suraj, Anukul Roy, Utkarsh Singh, Supriyo Chakraborty, Saurabh Shekhar, Vikas Kumar, Vivekanand Tiwary, Manish, Ravi Kumar Yadav, Raunak Kumar
Bihar: Veer Pratap Singh (capt), Shakibul Gani (vice-capt), Bipin Sourabh, Akash Raj, Shraman Nigrodh (wk), Babul Kumar, Ayush Loharuka (wk), Raghwendra Pratap Singh, Mayank Choudhary, Himanshu Singh, Sachin Kumar Singh, Abhijeet Saket, Anuj Raj, Shakib Hussain, Shabbir Khan, Rishav Raj, Harsh Vikram Singh, Jitin Kumar Yadav, Yashpal Yadav, Rishi Raj
Mumbai: Ajinkya Rahane (c), Prithvi Shaw, Ayush Mhatre, Angkrish Raghuvanshi, Shreyas Iyer, Siddhessh Lad, Suryansh Shedge, Hardik Tamore (WK), Sidhaant Addhatrao (WK), Shams Mulani, Tanush Kotian, Himanshu Singh, Shardul Thakur, Mohit Avasthi, Mohd. Juned Khan, Royston Dias.
You can also check out the full squads of all the teams by clicking here.
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