Cricket Buzz: Ranji Trophy from December 7, Karnataka, Mumbai in Group A

The Board of Control for Cricket in India's tournament committee announced on Friday that the forthcoming domestic season begins with the Duleep Trophy starting on October 15 while the prestigious Ranji Trophy will start from December 7 and continue till March 12.

The Duleep Trophy will be a three-week affair from October 15 to November 3.

With 50-overs World Cup in Australia and New Zealand slated in February-March next year, the BCCI will conduct the National One Day Championship from November 7-25. The zonal phase will be held from November 7-14 while the Vijay Hazare Trophy for the knock-out phase will be held from November 19-25.

The Deodhar Trophy inter-zonal One-Dayers will be held between November 29-December 3.

The Ranji Trophy's group league fixtures will be held between December 7-February 8 followed by the quarter-finals between February 15-19. The two semi-finals will be held between February 25-March 1 while final will be held from March 8-12.

The Ranji Trophy will be followed by Irani Cup from March 17-21 while the zonal leg of the National T20 Championship for the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy will be held between March 25-28. The final leg will be played from April 1-7.

The Ranji Trophy groupings have also been done with almost all the top teams like defending champions Karnataka, 40-time champions Mumbai, formidable Uttar Pradesh and Tamil Nadu are all clubbed in the same group.

Delhi are in a relatively less tough group with notable teams being last year's runners-up Maharashtra and Punjab.

Ranji Trophy Groups:

Group A: Karnataka, Bengal, Mumbai, Railways, Uttar Pradesh, Baroda, Tamil Nadu, Jammu and Kashmir, Madhya Pradesh

Group B: Maharashtra, Punjab, Gujarat, Saurashtra, Rajasthan, Delhi, Vidarbha, Haryana, Odisha

Group C: Goa, Himachal Pradesh, Kerala, Hyderabad, Andhra, Assam, Tripura, Jharkhand, Services.

Please click NEXT for more...

Outgoing chief of the Australian Cricketers' Association (ACA) Paul Marsh has accused Cricket Australia (CA) of buckling under the pressure of Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), which has made CA a follower rather than a leader on the world stage.

Marsh believes that CA's tendency to put financial considerations first has led to many decisions being compromised, while he gave CA boss James Sutherland and his team credit for significant gains in Australian cricket on the commercial front and for the recent resurgence of the Test and ODI teams, The Dawn reported.

Marsh said that he had no confidence that an incident such as the infamous Andrew Symonds-Harbhajan Singh 'Monkeygate' scandal would be handled differently in 2014 than it was in 2008, when Ricky Ponting's men felt betrayed by its board in the belief it sought to safeguard India's tour before supporting a player who had been racially abused.

Marsh said that he feels CA has shown all too often that it would succumb to the threats of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) and every time they do this, the BCCI gets stronger.

Marsh said that internationally he sees CA as a follower rather than a leader and this has meant their decisions are compromised by their desire not to upset the BCCI. He added that the CA allows itself to be compromised because they don''t want to risk the money that comes from India.