The European T20 Premier League (ETPL) on Tuesday unveiled the schedule for its inaugural season, with the six-team competition set to run from August 26 to September 20 across venues in the Netherlands and Ireland.
The opening match will feature Jonty Rhodes’ Rotterdam Dockers taking on Steve Waugh’s Amsterdam Flames at the Voorburg Cricket Club in The Hague on August 26.
The second fixture, scheduled for August 27, will see Rahul Dravid-backed Dublin Guardians, led by Ravichandran Ashwin, face Glenn Maxwell’s Belfast Wolves.
The tournament will begin in Voorburg before shifting to the Malahide Cricket Club in Dublin for the remainder of the league stage.
Malahide will also host the Qualifier and the final.
The inaugural edition will feature six teams from across Europe, bringing together some of the biggest names in world cricket alongside Europe’s finest homegrown talent.
Global stars including Tim David, Steve Smith, Faf du Plessis, Heinrich Klaasen, Mitchell Marsh, Lungi Ngidi and Trent Boult will share the stage with leading European players such as Paul Stirling, Scott Edwards, Josh Little, Jai Moondra, George Dockrell, Aryan Dutt, Max O’Dowd, Richie Berrington and Matthew Cross.
Each franchise will play every other team twice in a round-robin format. The team finishing at the top of the league table will qualify directly for the Final, while the second and third-placed teams will contest the Qualifier for the remaining place in the championship decider.
Rahul Dravid, Co-Owner, Dublin Guardians said in a release: “Representing Dublin in Europe’s newest franchise T20 league is exciting. We look forward to an exciting inaugural season and to building something the city and its fans can be proud of.”
ETPL is co-founded by Abhishek Bachchan, Saurav Banerjee, Priyanka Kaul and Dhiraj Malhotra.
The league has been developed in partnership with Cricket Ireland, Cricket Scotland and the Royal Dutch Cricket Association (KNCB).
