Lucknow, Jan 14: Former champions Kanpur Journalists XI will take on Varanasi Journalists XI in the opening match of the 7th Kabir Shah Memorial Media Cricket Tournament, starting on January 17, at the KD Singh ‘Babu’ stadium here under the auspices of the UP Sports Journalists Association.
This will be followed by the second match between the Delhi Journalists XI and Lucknow Journalist XI on the same day, at the same venue.
UPSJA press release today said that the winners of the first day’s matches would take on defending champions and hosts UPSJA in the first semi-final on January 18, whereas the second winners meet last year’s runners-up Allahabad XI on the same day. The final will be played on January 19. Besides cricket, all the six participating teams will also participate in the volleyball, basketball and football events at the same venue. Sports and Youth Welfare Minister Narad Rai would be the chief guest of the opening ceremony on January 17.
Meanwhile, Delhi Journalist XI and Allahabad Journalists XI announced their teams for the tournament. TEAMS; Delhi: Vikrant Gupta, GS Vivek, Siddhartha Sharma, Vinayak Padmadeo, Akash Rawal, Nikhil Naaz, Mahavir Rawat, Chetan Sharma, Amit Chaudhary, Neeraj Chauhan, Amit Sharma, Kapil Vashisht, Rajeev Mishra, Diwakar Singh. Manager: G Rajaraman.
Allahabad: Akhilesh Tripathi, Nivedan Shivpuri, Abbas Ali, Md Razi, Devendra Rai, Anand Raj, Anurag Kumar, Manish Paliwal, Md Moin, Saleem Ahmad, Sanjay Singh, Sunil Srivastav, Virendra Raj, Devendra Singh. Manager: Vimal Mishra. (UNI)