Finally, the IPL 2020 schedule has come out. The IPL 2020 will begin on 29th March, and the league stage will run till 17th May. There are no double-headers on Saturday, and all the six double-headers will be played on Sundays.
IPL 2020 will be the 13th edition of Indian Premier League (IPL). The last season’s finalists Mumbai Indians (MI) and Chennai Super Kings (CSK) will face each other in the IPL 2020 season opener on 29th March at Wankhede Stadium (Mumbai).
The record four-time winners MI will participate in this tournament as the defending champions. Meanwhile, the three-time IPL winners CSK were the runners-up in the last season. The other six teams of this tournament are – two-time champions Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR); one-time winners Rajasthan Royals (RR) & Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH); and the other three teams are Royal Challenger Bangalore (RCB), Delhi Capitals (DC) and Kings XI Punjab (KXIP).
While MI and CSK will begin the IPL 2020, the last league stage match will be between RCB and MI at Bengaluru 17th May. During the league stage, apart from 29th March (opening day) and 17th May (last day), all other Sundays have two games. While all the evening matches will begin at 8 pm (IST), the afternoon matches will start at 4 pm (IST).
Due to the lesser double-headers, the IPL 2020 league stage will run for 50 days. Last year, the league stage ran for 44 days.
Here is the full league stage schedule of IPL 2020
Apart from Rajasthan Royals, all other franchises will play their home matches in their original home venues. Meanwhile, Rajasthan franchise has wished to organise their first two home games at Guwahati, their second home venue. But, the officials from Rajasthan Cricket Association are against this decision and have filed pleas in the court.
Rajasthan Cricket Association owns Sawai Mansingh Stadium (Jaipur), which is the original home ground of Rajasthan Royals, and the other five home games of this season will be played at this venue.
On the other hand, there is no confirmation news about the scheduled date of the All-Stars match, which has been decided to be organised before the IPL 2020 opening game.
According to media reports, during the All-Stars match, one team will have the IPL players from north and east zone teams (Kings XI Punjab, Delhi Capitals, Rajasthan Royals and Kolkata Knight Riders) and another team will be formed with the IPL players of west and south zone teams (Mumbai Indians, Chennai Super Kings, Royal Challengers Bangalore, and Sunrisers Hyderabad).