Sri Lanka will be hosting the 2018 Nidahas Trophy as a way of celebrating its 70th year of independence. The 2018 Nidahas trophy is a cricket tournament that is to be held in March 2018. The matches will be played from 6th March 2018 to 18th March 2018- when the final will be played.

Organizers and the mode of play

The Sri Lanka Cricket – the body that governs cricket in Sri Lanka are the organizers of the tournament. They have announced that matches in the tournament will be played as Twenty20 International (T20) fixtures. As such, the matches will be limited to 20 overs of gameplay. The innings will last for about 80 minutes each with an interval of half an hour in between.

All the fixtures for the 2018 Nidahas Trophy will be played at the R. Premadasa Stadium in Colombo.

Participants

The tournament will pit Sri Lanka, India and Bangladesh in a tri-nation series.

Each nation will play the other two nations twice. From the fixtures, the two teams with the most points from the group stage will progress to the final.

Fixtures

All matches will be played at the R. Premadasa Stadium. All matches will kick-off at 1900hrs local time including the final.

  • The first match on 6th March 2018 will be between the hosts Sri Lanka and India
  • The second match will see Bangladesh clash with India on the 8th of March 2018.
  • The third match on 10th March will pit local boy’s Sri Lanka against Bangladesh.
  • The fourth match of the tournament on 12th March will be a repeat of the opening fixture between India and Sri Lanka.

On 14th March for the fifth match of the tournament, Bangladesh will face India.

The locals- Sri Lanka will round off their group stage fixtures by playing Bangladesh on the 16th of March. The two teams with the highest number of points from these fixtures will face each other in the final. The final will be on the 18th of March.

Where to watch the matches?

For the millions of cricket fans in India who will not make it to Colombo for the matches, you can watch the matches on Live TV via YuppTV. For the many Non-Resident Indians (NRIs) in the United Kingdom, Canada, United States, Europe, Middle East, Australia, New Zealand, Malaysia, Qatar, UAE, Saudi Arabia you can watch the Nidahas Trophy T20I matches online on Yupp TV. All the matches of the 2018 Nidahas Trophy tournament will be available on Yupp TV in these countries. Yupp TV has the exclusive rights to air the matches in these countries.

Some bit of history on India and the Nidahas Trophy

In 1998, as a commemoration of its 50th year of independence, Sri Lanka hosted the Nidahas Trophy. At the time, the trophy was known as the Singer Akai Nidahas Trophy due to sponsorship. It was a one-day international cricket tournament and ran from 19th June to 7th July 1998.

Just like the 2018 Nidahas Trophy, the 1998 one was a tri-nation series. In addition to the hosts-Sri Lanka, the two other nations were India and New Zealand.

Each of the three teams played the other two thrice and the two teams with the highest number of points after the matches progressed to the final.

Owing to poor weather especially rain, five of the nine qualifying matches had to be abandoned. In the group stage, Sri Lanka won three games and India had one win.

As a result, New Zealand were eliminated, and the final was between Sri Lanka and India. The final was played at the R. Premadasa Stadium in Colombo. The match was an exciting one, India won the toss and elected to bat.

On the day, Sachin Tendulkar (God of Cricket) and Sourav Ganguly (the Prince of Calcutta) broke the record for highest partnership for the first wicket in One Day Internationals (ODIs ) (252 runs). Sachin Tendulkar passed 7000 runs in the (ODIs). With such performances from their star men, India were simply too good for Sri Lanka and went on to beat Sri Lanka by 6 runs and win the trophy.

India’s chances this time round at the 2018 Nidahas Trophy. The Indian cricket team will head to Sri Lanka for the Nidahas Trophy right after their South African tour comes to an end on the 24th of February 2018. As such, they will head into the tournament with momentum having already played three test series, six One Day Internationals (ODIs), and three Twenty (20) International matches already in 2018 against one of the best cricket nations in the world – South Africa.

That and India’s good record against Bangladesh and Sri Lanka means they are likely to repeat the history and lift the Nidahas Trophy once again this year just like the team did in 1998. Get ready to witness the first match of India vs Sri Lanka Nidahas Trophy 2018 on March 6th.