Kolkata: The Bengal team will start their Ranji Trophy 2017-18 campaign with an away game. The first game will be against Services at the Palam Airport Ground at Delhi. The second game will also be an away when the Bengal squad will travel to Raipur in Chhattisgarh. Chattisgarh debuted in the previous season under the command of Md. Kaif.
Bengal’s first home match would be on November 1 against Himachal Pradesh while the second home game will be on November 9 against Vidarbha. Then again the team will fly to Mohali to face Punjab and the last group game of Group D for Bengal will be on November 25 against Goa at Kolkata.
The knockout phase starts on December 7-11 when the 4 quarter finals would be played. The 2 semis would be held on December 17-21 while the finals would be held from December 29 and would end on January 2 2018.
Alongside the BCCI also published the schedule for the Vijay Hazare Trophy. Bengal is allotted in ‘Group-B’ and along with Bengal the other 6 teams would be Maharashtra, UPCA (Uttar Pradesh Cricket Association), Delhi, Tripura, Himachal Pradesh and Kerala.
All games of ‘Group-B’ will be played in Himachal Pradesh. Bengal will begin the fifty over game campaign against Maharashtra on February 16 and on the next day Bengal will face Kerala. After a day’s gap Bengal will play on 19th against Uttar Pradesh and Delhi on the 20th. The games against Tripura and Himachal Pradesh will be on February 22 and 25 respectively.
The first two quarter finals would take place on March 3, while the next two games will be on March 4. The 2 semis would take place on March 6 and the finals will be on March 8.
Last season Bengal began their Ranji campaign at a neutral venue which can be treated as an away ground. Bengal coach Sairaj Bahutule informed us over the telephone that, “Last year we played away and we performed very well. The ground and the opponents are not a factor as the sole objective is that our players should play well. The boys are very focused as the pre-season has started. The side would gain a lot from Wriddhiman Saha and Sudip Chatterjee who have just returned from their respective foreign campaign of the National side”.