Teams ready for Jay Trophy starting on Jan. 5

By A Staff Reporter,Kathmandu, Jan. 4: Wearing white, players representing the Top 4 teams of the Men’s PM Cup 2024 will be in action with a red ball in two venues of Madhes Province – Janakpur and Parsa – from January 5 as they compete in the Jay Trophy, a multi-day cricket tournament between elite domestic teams.

Nepal Police Club (NPC), the winner and table topper of the Men’s PM Cup, along with the second-, third-, and fourth-placed Tribhuvan Army Club (TAC), Bagmati Province, and Madhes Province are the teams competing in the Jay Trophy.

The event will be inaugurated on January 5 in both venues simultaneously. Janakpur will see the two provincial teams – Madhes and Bagmati – in action while Parsa will mark a departmental derby – NPC vs TAC – in the opener.

In the Men’s PM Cup played in a single round-robin between 10 teams in January-February 2024, Bagmati defeated Madhes by 86 runs on January 16. Likewise, NPC had defeated TAC twice, once in the group stage (January 21) and the other in the final for the title (February 3).

Nevertheless, there is a high chance for the previous dominance to end as players of Madhes and TAC are on a high after a good performance in the first Nepal Premier League.

NPC will also be finding a shortage with the lack of Dipendra Singh Airee. It is because Airee, World’s No. 2 T20I All-rounder, will be in the UAE for ILT20. 

Madhes will also be finding it difficult without Anil Kumar Sah and Pawan Sarraf. Sah was injured in the NPL while Sarraf is still unfit. Sah and Sarraf were the first and fourth-highest run scorers in the PM Cup respectively. Yet, without the two major batters, Madhes, which is still buzzing since Janakpur Bolts lifted the NPL, will be a tough opponent in their home. Bagmati, on the other hand, has signed Sandeep Lamichhane and strengthened their squad. 

Meanwhile, except for the host Madhes, three other teams have made public their squad for the Jay Trophy. Madhes has only revealed a 22-member preliminary squad.

Final squads

Bagmati Province: Sandeep Lamichhane (C), Surya Tamang, Rijan Dhakal, Pratish GC, Uttam Thapa Magar, Aashutosh Ghiraiya, Rit Gautam, Ishan Pandey, Bipin Acharya, Shuv Kansakar, Roshan BK, Suryanshu Koirala, Nandan Yadav, Pratik Shrestha, Tilak Rajbhandari.

Tribhuvan Army Club: Binod Bhandari (C), Sompal Kami, Kushal Malla, Bibek Kumar Yadav, Bhim Sarki, Basir Ahmad, Santosh Karki, Imran Sheikh, Trit Raj Das, Shahab Alam, Naren Saud, Durgesh Gupta, Akash Chand, Pawan Karki, Sumit Shrestha.

Nepal Police Club: Aarif Sheikh (C), Kushal Bhurtel, Gulshan Kumar Jha, Lalit Narayan Rajbanshi, Karan KC, Amit Shrestha, Dilip Nath, Shravan Yadav, Sunil Daulyan, Sagar Dhakal, Shankar Rana, Avinash Karn, Rashid Khan, Arjun Saud, Dipak Serela. 

Fixtures

The league-stage game between the four teams will be played in a single round-robin format with each game played across the two-day format. There is a rest day after every game.

After Bagmati and Madhes on January 5 and 6, Janakpur will host TAC vs Bagmati and NPC vs Bagmati on January 8-9 and January 11-12 respectively.

Similarly, after TAC vs NPC on January 5-6, Parsa will host Madhes vs NPC on January 8-9 and TAC vs Madhes on January 11-12. 

According to the Cricket Association of Nepal (CAN), only the final will be played across three days where the top two teams in the league stage will compete for the trophy.