Nagesh Trophy Men's National T20 Cricket Tournament For Blind Kicks Off In Jammu; J&K, Goa Register Wins

Nagesh Trophy men's national T20 cricket tournament for blind kicks off in Jammu; J&K, Goa register (Image Source: IANS)

National T20 Cricket Tournament: The 6th edition of Men's National T20 Cricket Tournament for the Blind 2023-24 also known as Nagesh Trophy, kicked off with four teams battling out on Day 1 here.

The Nagesh Trophy is being played from November 23, 2023, to January 30, 2024. The League stage will be played till December 29, 2023. In the first match of the League stage of Nagesh Trophy in Group E, Jammu & Kashmir J&K) thrashed Indian Railways by 82 runs here at the University of Jammu.

In the second match of the league stage on Thursday, Goa defeated Punjab by 3 wickets here at the University of Jammu.

Batting first, Jammu and Kashmir slammed a mammoth total of 234/4 in the allotted 20 overs with Mohammad Azeem scoring 158 runs in just 77 balls. The side then bowled out Railways for 152 in 18 overs to kick start their campaign with a win.

The second match of the league stage turned out to be a nail biter as Goa defeated Punjab by 3 wickets in the last over. Batting first, Punjab bowled out for 161in the allotted 20 overs. Goa initially struggled in the chase but a fine batting performance by Ravi M made sure the side crossed the line with 2 balls to spare.

Former Indian cricketer Mohammad Kaif has also joined hands with Cricket Association for the Blind in India (CABI) as Brand Ambassador for Nagesh Trophy.

On Friday, Railways and Goa will meet in the first match of the day while Punjab and Jammu & Kashmir will face off each other in the second game here at University of Jammu.

After the league matches end on December 29, 2023, Cricket Association for the Blind in India (CABI) in association with the Samarthanam Trust for the Disabled will hold the Super 8 Stage Matches at Nagpur, Maharashtra in January 2024.

The league matches of the 6th edition of the IndusInd Bank Nagesh Trophy will be played across 6 venues namely, Jammu, Dehradun (Uttarakhand), Kochi (Kerala), Chandigarh, Agarthala (Tripura), and Kota (Rajasthan).

A total of 28 Teams (State /UT’s and an Indian Railways team which is represented by the Visually Impaired working in Railways) will play the T20 format Tournament. 28 teams are divided based on the last year's ranking into 6 groups. The first 4 groups have 5 teams each and the last 2 teams have 4 teams each.

The 5th edition had the joint winners (Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka) due to the rain. Odisha has won the Nationals once while Andhra Pradesh had emerged victorious in the finals of the tournament 3 times.