Duleep Trophy 2025 to begin in Bengaluru from August 28

By Abhishek Kumar

The new domestic cricket season in India will start with the Duleep Trophy 2025–26, which will be played from August 28 to September 15 at the BCCI Centre of Excellence, Bengaluru.

The tournament will be played in a knockout format. Six zonal teams will take part — North, South, East, West, Central, and North-East. Last year’s top performers, South Zone and West Zone, will directly play in the semi-finals, while the other four teams will fight in the quarter-finals to reach the last four.

The opening matches will be North Zone vs East Zone and Central Zone vs North-East Zone. The winners of these matches will face South and West Zones in the semi-finals. The final match will be played from September 11 to 15.

Star Players & Captains

Many well-known players are part of this edition. Ishan Kishan will lead East Zone, Dhruv Jurel will captain Central Zone, and West Zone has strong names like Shreyas Iyer, Yashasvi Jaiswal, and Ruturaj Gaikwad. However, Shubman Gill is expected to miss the start due to illness, which is a setback for North Zone.

This tournament is very important as it gives domestic players a chance to perform and get noticed by the national selectors.