Ranji Trophy season set to commence on January 5 as BCCI announces 2023-24 domestic schedule

The schedule for the forthcoming domestic cricket season 2023-24 has been announced by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI). The Ranji Trophy, the premier first-class competition, will begin on January 5, 2024. With the league stage ending on February 19 and the knockout rounds beginning on February 23, the tournament will conclude on March 14.

The Duleep Trophy will kick off the 2023-24 domestic season on June 28 to July 16, followed by the Deodhar Trophy, which will take place from July 24 to August 4. The Irani Trophy, which will be played by the current Ranji Trophy champions Saurashtra and the Rest of India, is set to take place from October 1 to 5, as reported by Cricbuzz. 

The Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy will be contested from October 16 to November 6, followed by the Vijay Hazare Trophy from November 23 to December 15, according to the published schedule. There will be two divisions in both tournaments- Elite and Plate. The Elite division will consist of three groups of eight teams, whereas Plate will comprise two groups of seven teams.  

The Ranji Trophy will also feature two divisions- Elite and Plate, with four groups of eight teams in the top division, and the bottom division will consist of one group of six teams. A team in the Elite division can play up to 10 multi-day matches, which includes seven league games, followed by the quarterfinals, semifinal, and final.

The top two teams in each of the four Elite groups will advance to the quarterfinals. Meanwhile, the top four teams in the Plate division will meet in the semifinals. The Plate Group finalists will be promoted to the Elite Group for the 2024-25 season, while the bottom two teams from the Elite Groups will be relegated to the Plate Group based on points, bonus points, wins, and quotient.

This is how the teams were grouped -

Elite Group A: Winners; QF loser Rank 4; Elite Rank 9, 16, 17, 24, 25; and Plate Rank 2. The teams in this group are Saurashtra, Jharkhand, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Vidarbha, Haryana, Services, and Manipur.

Elite Group B: Runners-up; QF loser Rank 3; Elite Rank 10, 15, 18, 23, 26; and Plate Rank 1. The teams in this group are Bengal, Andhra, Mumbai, Kerala, Chhattisgarh, Uttar Pradesh, Assam, and Bihar.

Elite Group C: SF loser Rank 1; QF loser Rank 2; Elite Rank 11, 14, 19, 22, 27; and Elite Rank 30. The teams in this group are Karnataka, Punjab, Railways, Tamil Nadu, Goa, Gujarat, Tripura, and Chandigarh.

Elite Group D: SF loser Rank 2; QF loser Rank 1; Elite Rank 12, 13, 20, 21, 28, 29. The teams in this group are Madhya Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh, Baroda, Delhi, Odisha, Pondicherry, and Jammu and Kashmir.

Plate Group: Elite Rank 31, 32; Plate Rank 3, 4, 5, 6. The teams in this group are Nagaland, Hyderabad, Meghalaya, Sikkim, Mizoram, and Arunachal Pradesh.