As the season of domestic cricket has been spread all over the world over the years recently its very much frequent we see players representing their national sides & also due to the popularity of such domestic T20 tournaments played in various parts of the world,people are also stuck to such format due to its excitement!!!
But the real part of cricket lies in supporting our nation & see our favorite players representing our team.So for this year,right in this month its time for some action packed cricket as we come across with a major prestigious tournament of cricket which is ICC Champions Trophy!!!

HISTORY OF THIS TOURNAMENT

The ICC Champions Trophy is a One Day International circuit organised by International Cricket Council(ICC) Which is also termed as the second important cricket tournament only next to ICC Cricket World Cup!!!It was inaugurated as the ICC Knock Out Tournament in 1998 and has been played approximately every two years.Then later its name was changed to ICC Champions Trophy in 2002.The number of teams competing has varied over the years; originally all the ICC's full members took part,and from 2000 to 2004 associate members were also involved.Since 2009, the tournament has only involved the eight highest-ranked ODI teams as of six months prior to the tournament.The ICC intends that the 2013 Champions Trophy will be last,with its place in the cricketing calendar taken by a new format ICC World Test Championship.

ICC Champions Trophy
Administrator	International Cricket Council
Format	One Day International
First tournament	1998
Last tournament	2013
Tournament format	Round robin (current) Knock-out (previously)
Number of teams	8
Current champion	Australia
Most successful	Australia (2 titles)
Most runs	Chris Gayle (695)
Most wickets	Muttiah Muralitharan(24)

FORMAT OF THE TOURNAMENT

The Champions Trophy differs from the World Cup in a number of ways. The Champions Trophy takes place every two years, while the World Cup is held every four years. The matches in the Champions Trophy are held over a period of around two weeks, while the World Cup can last for over a month. For 2002 and 2004, twelve teams played a round-robin tournament in four pools of three, with the top team in each pool moving forward to the semi-final. A team would play only four games (two in the pool, semi-final and final) to win the tournament. In 2006, eight teams played in two pools of four, with the top two teams in each pool playing in the semi-finals. Losing even a single match would potentially mean elimination from the tournament.

The format used in the Knock Out tournaments differed from the formats used in the Champions Trophy. The competition was a straight knock out, with no pools and the loser in each game being eliminated. Only 8 games were played in 1998, and 10 games in 2000.

RECORDS MADE IN THIS TOURNAMENT

Year	Host	Winner	Runners up	Format	Final Venue
1998	Bangladesh	South Africa	West Indies	Knockout	Bangabandhu National Stadium
2000	Kenya	New Zealand	India	Knockout	Nairobi Gymkhana Club
2002	Sri Lanka	India and  Sri Lanka	__	Round-robin	R. Premadasa Stadium
2004	England	West Indies	England	Round-robin	The Oval
2006	India	Australia	West Indies	Round-robin	Brabourne Stadium
2009	South Africa	Australia	New Zealand	Round-robin	SuperSport Park
2013	England  Wales	Yet to know	Yet to know	Round-robin	Edgbaston Cricket Ground

BATTING

Leading run scorers

Player	Matches	Runs
CH Gayle	14	695
SC Ganguly	13	665
JH Kallis	17	653
R Dravid	19	627
RT Ponting	18	593

Highest individual score

Player	Opposition	HS
Nathan Astle	Australia	145*
Andy Flower	India	145
Sourav Ganguly	South Africa	141*
Sachin Tendulkar	Australia	141
Graeme Smith	England	141

BOWLING

Leading wicket takers

Player	Matches	Wickets
Muttiah Muralitharan	15	24
Kyle Mills	12	22
Brett Lee	16	22
Glenn McGrath	12	21
Jacques Kallis	17	20

Best bowling

Player	Opposition	Figure
Farveez Maharoof	West Indies	6/14
Shahid Afridi	Kenya	5/11
Makhaya Ntini	Pakistan	5/21
Mervyn Dillon	Bangladesh	5/29
Jacques Kallis	West Indies	5/30

ICC CHAMPIONS TROPHY 2013

This years Champions trophy will be full of excitement with some power-packed performances which is been most expected by some quality players.The very first thing to mention is this year year the tournament is held in England and as the name suggests 'CHAMPIONS TROPHY' some of the champion teams are desperately trying to push themselves hard to be the champion of the champions this year.The squads of all the 8  teams & fixtures of the ICC Champions Trophy 2013 is given below.Please have a close look at it!!!

GROUPS

 Group A                                            Group B

*Australia                                          *India

*England                                           *Pakistan

*New Zealand                                    *South Africa

*Sri Lanka                                         *West Indies

SQUADS

AUSTRALIA

Michael Clarke (capt)

George Bailey (vice-capt)

David Warner

Shane Watson

Phil Hughes

Adam Voges

Mitchell Marsh

Matthew Wade

Glenn Maxwell

James Faulkner

Mitchell Johnson

Mitchell Starc

Clint McKay

Nathan Coulter-Nile

Xavier Doherty. 

ENGLAND

Alastair Cook

James Anderson

Jonathan Bairstow

Gary Balance

Ian Bell

Ravi Bopara

Tim Bresnan

Danny Briggs

Stuart Broad

Jos Buttler

Varun Chopra

Rikki Clarke

Jade Dernbach

Steven Finn

Alex Hales

James Harris

Craig Kieswetter

Stuart Meaker

Eoin Morgan

Graham Onions

Samit Patel

Kevin Pietersen

Joe Root

Graeme Swann

James Taylor 

James Tredwell

Jonathan Trott

Chris Wright

Luke Wright

Chris Woakes 

NEW ZELAND

Brendon McCullum (captain)

Trent Boult

Grant Elliott

Andrew Ellis

James Franklin

Martin Guptill

Mitchell McClenaghan

Nathan McCullum

Kyle Mills

Colin Munro

Luke Ronchi

Tim Southee

Ross Taylor

Daniel Vettori

Kane Williamson 

SRI LANKA

Malinga Bandara

Dinesh Chandimal

Tillakaratne Dilshan

Shaminda Eranga

Rangana Herath

Ishara Jayaratne

Shehan Jayasuriya

Mahela Jayawardena

Thilina Kandamby

Chamara Kapugedera

Nuwan Kulasekara

Suranga Lakmal 

Dilhara Lokuhettige

Farveez Maharoof

Lasith Malinga

Angelo Mathews

Ajantha Mendis

Jeevan Mendis

Angelo Perera

Dilruwan Perera

Kusal Perera

Kumar Sangakkara

Sachithra Senanayake

Milinda Siriwardana

Upul Tharanga

Lahiru Thirimanne

Thisara Perera

Seekuge Prasanna

Chanaka Welagedara

Kithruwan Vithanage 

INDIA

MS Dhoni (capt)

Shikhar Dhawan

Virat Kohli

Suresh Raina

Dinesh Karthik

Murali Vijay

Rohit Sharma

Ravindra Jadeja

Ravichandran Ashwin

Irfan Pathan

Umesh Yadav

Bhuvneshwar Kumar

Ishant Sharma

Amit Mishra

Vinay Kumar

PAKISTAN

Nasir Jamshed

Mohammad Hafeez

Imran Farhat

Kamran Akmal

Misbah-ul-Haq (c)

Shoaib Malik

Asad Shafiq

Saeed Ajmal

Junaid Khan

M. Irfan

Asad Ali

Wahab Riaz

Umer Amin

Abdul Rehman

Ehsan Adil

SOUTH AFRICA

AB de Villiers (capt, wkt)

Hashim Amla

Farhaan Behardien

JP Duminy

Faf du Plessis

Colin Ingram

Rory Kleinveldt

Ryan McLaren

David Miller

Morne Morkel

Robin Peterson

Aaron Phangiso

Graeme Smith/Alviro Petersen

Dale Steyn

Lonwabo Tsotsobe

WEST INDIES

Dwayne Bravo (capt)

Denesh Ramdin (wkt)

Tino Best

Darren Bravo

Johnson Charles

Chris Gayle

Jason Holder

Sunil Narine

Kieron Pollard

Ravi Rampaul

Kemar Roach

Darren Sammy

Marlon Samuels

Ramnaresh Sarwan

Devon Smith

FIXTURES

Date and Time	Match Details and Series
Thu May 30 13:00 local | 12:00 GMT	Warm-up ODI - Pakistan vs Sri Lanka Edgbaston, Birmingham
Sat Jun 1 10:30 local | 09:30 GMT	Warm-up ODI - India vs Sri Lanka Edgbaston, Birmingham
Sat Jun 1 13:00 local | 12:00 GMT	Warm-up ODI - Australia vs West Indies Sophia Gardens, Cardiff
Mon Jun 3 10:30 local | 09:30 GMT	Warm-up ODI - Pakistan vs South Africa Kennington Oval, London
Tue Jun 4 10:30 local | 09:30 GMT	Warm-up ODI - Australia vs India Sophia Gardens, Cardiff
Tue Jun 4 10:30 local | 09:30 GMT	Warm-up ODI - Sri Lanka vs West Indies Edgbaston, Birmingham
Thu Jun 6 10:30 local | 09:30 GMT	Group B : 1st ODI - India vs South Africa  Sophia Gardens, Cardiff
Fri Jun 7 10:30 local | 09:30 GMT	Group B : 2nd ODI - Pakistan vs West Indies  Kennington Oval, London
Sat Jun 8 10:30 local | 09:30 GMT	Group A : 3rd ODI - England vs Australia  Edgbaston, Birmingham
Sun Jun 9 10:30 local | 09:30 GMT	Group A : 4th ODI - New Zealand vs Sri Lanka  Sophia Gardens, Cardiff
Mon Jun 10 13:00 local | 12:00 GMT	Group B : 5th ODI - Pakistan vs South Africa  Edgbaston, Birmingham
Tue Jun 11 10:30 local | 09:30 GMT	Group B : 6th ODI - India vs West Indies  Kennington Oval, London
Wed Jun 12 10:30 local | 09:30 GMT	Group A : 7th ODI - Australia vs New Zealand  Edgbaston, Birmingham
Thu Jun 13 13:00 local | 12:00 GMT	Group A : 8th ODI - England vs Sri Lanka  Kennington Oval, London
Fri Jun 14 10:30 local | 09:30 GMT	Group B : 9th ODI - South Africa vs West Indies  Sophia Gardens, Cardiff
Sat Jun 15 10:30 local | 09:30 GMT	Group B : 10th ODI - India vs Pakistan  Edgbaston, Birmingham
Sun Jun 16 10:30 local | 09:30 GMT	Group A : 11th ODI - England vs New Zealand  Sophia Gardens, Cardiff
Mon Jun 17 13:00 local | 12:00 GMT	Group A : 12th ODI - Australia vs Sri Lanka  Kennington Oval, London
Wed Jun 19 10:30 local | 09:30 GMT	1st Semi Final ODI - TBC vs TBC (A1 v B2) Kennington Oval, London
Thu Jun 20 10:30 local | 09:30 GMT	2nd Semi Final ODI - TBC vs TBC (A2 v B1) Sophia Gardens, Cardiff
Sun Jun 23 10:30 local | 09:30 GMT	Final ODI - TBC vs TBC  Edgbaston, Birmingham

We hope that this post was helpful!!! Enjoy the season of cricket ahead & do support your favorite team right throughout this tournament!!!

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