IPL 2022 to begin on March 26, Lucknow & Gujarat teams placed in 2 separate groups

India's biggest cricket festival, the TATA Indian Premier League 2022 is set to begin on March 26 with Maharashtra being the only state to host all the league matches. As per reports, all 70 matches of the league phase will be played at four international-standard stadiums across Mumbai and Pune.

With 10 teams in the fray for the title honour, 20 matches will be held at Wankhede Stadium, followed by another 20 at DY Patil Stadium in Navi Mumbai. The Brabourne Stadium and Pune's MCA International Stadium will host 15 matches each, while the four playoffs will be played at Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad.

IPL teams to play 14 matches each

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Coming back to India after 2 years, the 15th edition of IPL is all set to kickstart the cricket shenanigans in a bio-secure environment, entirely in Maharashtra. Notably, a single-hub bio-secure environment has been set up across Mumbai and Pune to avoid air travel and as such, the risk of COVID-19 infection. This will ensure a smooth tournament, with maximum pandemic safety for the players.

Since there are 10 teams in IPL Season 15, with the addition of Lucknow Super Giants and Gujarat Titans, all teams are expected to play 14 league matches each (seven home as well as away). This is because each will play five teams twice while facing the remaining four teams only once. Two of these will be played on home ground, followed by two other away matches.

IPL 2022 to have an all-new format

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This is the first time that IPL will be held in a format other than the double round-robin, where each team faces its competitors twice. However, the new format will involve dividing all teams into two virtual groups based on the number of times being crowned the IPL Champions followed by the number of times the teams reached the tournament finals:

Each team will play twice with the teams in their group and with the team in the same row in the second group. With the rest of the teams in the second group, they will play only once during the season. The entire schedule for the tournament will be announced soon. Meanwhile, the host broadcaster, Star Sports, has already asked the commentators to make themselves available from March 9 itself. However, a decision on the spectators limit in the stadium will soon have to be decided by the Maharashtra government.

-with agency inputs