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The opening match of the 18th season of IPL will be played in Kolkata on March 21.
The first match of IPL 2025 will be played in Kolkata on 21 March. The final of the tournament will also be held here on May 25. At the same time, the third season of the Women’s Premier League (WPL) will start from 7 February and will run till 2 March. This time the tournament will be played at 4 venues.
According to the report of Cricinfo, the IPL committee has sent the details of the start of the tournament to all the franchises. So that they can start their preparations regarding the players. Kolkata Knight Riders is the defending champion of IPL, the team defeated Sunrisers Hyderabad in the final.
Tournament will start late due to Champions Trophy IPL mega auction took place in November. The committee had told all the teams the probable schedule for the next 3 years. According to which this time the tournament was to be held from March 15 to May 25. However, the ICC Champions Trophy final will be played on March 9. Therefore, to give rest to the players, BCCI extended the date of IPL by one week.
The Champions Trophy will be played in Pakistan and UAE starting from 19th February till 9th March. IPL will start after 2 weeks. Even if Team India reaches the finals, the players will have more time for rest. The complete schedule of IPL can be released at the end of January.
First match at home of defending champion It has been a tradition in IPL that the first and final matches of the next season are played at the home ground of the defending champion team. In 2024, Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) won the title in Chennai. Therefore now the opening and final matches will be held in Kolkata. However, which team KKR will face in the opening match has not been revealed yet.
There will be 74 matches in the 18th season 2025 will be the 18th season of IPL, the tournament started in 2008 and has been played every year since then. There will be 74 matches in the 18th season, the same number of matches are being played in every season from 2022. When IPL sold its broadcasting rights in 2022, it had said that there would be 84 matches in the 2025 and 2026 seasons. However, to manage the workload of the players, the committee is going to organize only 74 matches this time.
KKR won the IPL title after 10 years in 2024. The team got its last win in 2014.
WPL will be held on 4 grounds BCCI has also decided that this time WPL will be played on 4 grounds. Last season, all the matches were played in Mumbai and Bengaluru, this time too both the venues have got hosting. However, this time Kotambi Stadium of Vadodara and Ekana Stadium of Lucknow have also got hosting. The matches are to be held at Brabourne Stadium in Mumbai. How many matches will be held at which venue will become clear only after the schedule is released.
WPL was started in 2023. Mumbai Indians won the title in the first season and Royal Challengers Bangalore won the title in the last season. Both the teams had defeated Delhi Capitals in the final. 22 matches will be played between 5 teams in the tournament.
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