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IPL 2025 to resume on May 17, final to be played on June 3
IPL 2025 will resume on May 17 and end on June 3, as per the revised schedule announced by the BCCI on Monday night.
The remainder of the tournament, which was suspended on May 9 for a week due to cross-border tensions between India and Pakistan, will be played at six venues: Bengaluru, Jaipur, Delhi, Lucknow, Mumbai and Ahmedabad. The venues for the playoffs will be announced later, but the matches will be played on the following dates: Qualifier 1 on May 29, the Eliminator on May 30, Qualifier 2 on June 1 and the final on June 3. A total of 17 matches will be played after the resumption, with two double-headers, both of which will be played on Sundays.
The revised schedule features 13 league games and the four playoff matches. This means that the Punjab Kings (PBKS) vs Delhi Capitals (DC) game, which was called off midway through the first innings on May 8 in Dharamsala, will be played again, on May 24 in Jaipur, which will be the temporary home base for PBKS. Two days later, PBKS will play against Mumbai Indians (MI), a match they were originally meant to play in their second home base of Dharamsala on May 11. The match that will restart the tournament on May 17 will be played between Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) and Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) in Bengaluru.
On the first of the two double-header days, Rajasthan Royals (RR) will meet PBKS in the day game (3.30pm IST) on May 18 and DC will take on Gujarat Titans (GT) in the evening (7.30pm IST). The next Sunday – May 25 – will see GT take on Chennai Super Kings (CSK) in the day game in Ahmedabad and Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) meet KKR in Delhi at 7.30pm IST. The last league game will be between Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) and RCB on May 27 in Lucknow.
The change in venues also means that three teams – PBKS, CSK and SRH – won’t get to play on their original home grounds anymore. With CSK and SRH out of the playoffs race, PBKS will count themselves unlucky to be playing two of their home matches at a neutral venue. With 15 points from 11 matches, PBKS were third on the points table before the tournament was suspended.
The official release said the BCCI held “extensive consultations with government and security agencies, and with all the key stakeholders” before finalising the resumption of the tournament.
The delayed finish of the IPL, which was originally scheduled to end on May 25 in Kolkata, means it will now coincide with the entire ODI series between England and West Indies starting on May 29 in Birmingham and ending on June 3 at The Oval. It will lead to a clash for Romario Shepherd (RCB), Shamar Joseph (LSG) and Sherfane Rutherford (GT), who have all been picked in the West Indies ODI squad. England have not named their squad yet but the players likely to be affected are Jos Buttler (GT), Phil Salt (RCB), Jacob Bethell (RCB), Liam Livingston (RCB), Will Jacks (MI) and Reece Topley (MI), depending on which teams make the playoffs.
The revised IPL schedule also squeezes the gap between the IPL final and the WTC final to just seven days, with Australia and South Africa set to contest the Test world title from June 11 at Lord’s. Both Australia and South Africa are scheduled to announce their squads on Tuesday. The players who are currently part of the IPL teams and are likely to be picked for the WTC final are Australia captain Pat Cummins and Travis Head (both SRH), Mitchell Starc and Tristan Stubbs (both DC), Josh Hazlewood (RCB), Marco Jansen and Josh Inglis (both PBKS), Aiden Markram (LSG), Kagiso Rabada (GT), Ryan Rickelton (MI) and Kwena Mphaka (RR).
The revised schedule will also potentially impact the India A tour of England, which is scheduled to begin from May 30, for two unofficial Tests in Canterbury and Northampton. Several fringe India players, some of whom are likely to be part of the India squad for the five-Test series starting on June 20 in England, will now be part of the IPL when the A matches begin.
For now, the biggest challenge for the 10 IPL franchises will be to re-assemble their squads and bring back overseas players and support-staff members who had begun flying back home over the weekend. The team that could find it easiest to get back together will be GT, currently on top of the table, who had seen only two of their overseas players fly back: Buttler and Gerald Coetzee. The rest of their squad was continuing to train in Ahmedabad. MI could also benefit from the revised schedule, as their first game is on May 21, four days after the tournament resumes.
A major storm hit the US east coast on Monday, bringing record-breaking snow that caused disruptions for millions and thousands of flight cancellations.
Parts of Rhode Island and Massachusetts have seen nearly 37in (94cm) of snowfall, with more than 19in in New York City’s Central Park, the National Weather Service (NWS) said.
Weather warnings stretched from North Carolina to northern Maine, with some in place further north in parts of eastern Canada.
More than 600,000 properties on the US east coast endured power outages, while the Boston Globe – a major US newspaper – said it will not go to print for the first time in its 153-year history due to the storm.
(BBC)
Pakistan have recalled Shaheen Shah Afridi for their Super Eight fixture against England in Pallekle at the expense of Faheem Ashraf, and will bat first after Salman Agha won the toss on a fresh pitch.
Afridi’s nine overs at the T20 World Cup have cost 101 runs and he has been left out for consecutive matches after Pakistan’s heavy defeat to India in Colombo, including their no-result against New Zealand to start the Super Eight stage. But he has been recalled to face England, perhaps due to their top order’s perceived vulnerability against left-arm seam.
Ashraf rescued Pakistan in their opening group-stage match against the Netherlands, hitting 29 not out off 11 balls to secure a three-wicket win. But he has only bowled two overs in the tournament and has been batting down the order.
“It looks like a good pitch,” Agha said at the toss. “We want to put up an above-par score and defend that total.”
England will qualify for the semi-finals if they win either of their remaining Super Eight fixtures, but Brook said that he would rather get the job done this evening than face a must-win match against New Zealand on Friday. “That would be lovely, wouldn’t it? But you never know in T20 cricket, it’s such a fickle game,” he said.
Brook said that he would have chosen to bat first if he had won the toss, but expects a better surface than the one that England played on at Pallekele two days ago in their low-scoring win over Sri Lanka. “Hopefully, it’s going to be a little bit better,” he said. “We haven’t had our perfect game yet. Hopefully, it’s just around the corner.”
England have picked the same team for the fifth consecutive match at this World Cup, and have carded their batting line-up in the same order despite some calls for Brook to be promoted from No. 5.
The fixture is a rematch of the 2022 T20 World Cup final, which England won by five wickets at the MCG, and there are nine survivors across the two teams.
England: Phil Salt, Jos Buttler (wk), Jacob Bethell, Tom Banton, Harry Brook (capt), Sam Curran, Will Jacks, Jamie Overton, Liam Dawson, Jofra Archer, Adil Rashid.
Pakistan: Sahibzada Farhan, Saim Ayub, Salman Agha (capt), Babar Azam, Fakhar Zaman, Shadab Khan, Usman Khan (wk), Mohammad Nawaz, Shaheen Shah Afridi, Salman Mirza, Usman Tariq.
(Cricinfo)
During an operation conducted in the dark hours of 22 Feb 26, the Sri Lanka Navy seized an Indian fishing boat and apprehended twelve (12) Indian fishermen while they were poaching in Sri Lankan waters, in the sea area south of Mannar.
The seized boat and the Indian fishermen were handed over to the Fisheries Inspector of Dikovita for onward legal proceedings.
More than 5,000 flights cancelled as US east coast digs out of record snow
Pakistan bat vs unchanged England with Afridi back
Navy seize an Indian fishing boat poaching in Mannar seas
Fair weather will prevail except for showers in the Southern province and in Rathnapura, Monaragala and Kaluthara districts after 2.00 p.m
Families of those sentenced to death for killing MP Atukorale seek AKD’s intervention
OPV leaves Baltimore, expected in Colombo in May
‘Dates have the highest sugar content to fight Coronavirus’
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