The ICC Champions Trophy is a One Day International cricket tournament organised by the International Cricket Council (ICC), it is the second most important Cricket event, after the Cricket World Cup. The tournament involves the eight highest-ranked One Day International teams as of six months prior to the tournament.
Current
The 2013 tournament will be hosted in England, nine years after they last staged the event and Cardiff, Edgbaston and the Oval will be the grounds used to host the fixtures during the three-week tournament which begins June 6th. Each ground will host four group matches in the competition, which will see the eight teams divided into two pools of four. The top two teams from each group advance to the semi-finals which are hosted at the Oval and Cardiff. The winners of each semi-final then progress to the final at Edgbaston, Birmingham on Sunday 23 June.
Group A
England
Along with Australia, England were the first team to be granted Test status in 1877. England haven’t had the most success in One Day Internationals which includes finishing as runners-up in the World Cup on three occasions and also as runner up in the Champions Trophy in 2004. Although, they did win the World Twenty20 in 2010 and are the current holders of the Ashes. As the hosts, the pressure will be on the England team and they will want to perform well under this pressure by winning the Trophy. England start the tournament with a tough match against Australia at Edgbaston and what better statement to make than beating them.
Australia
Australia are the joint oldest team in test cricket and they have also won the last two Champions Trophy on the bounce, in 2007 and 2009, making them the first and only team to become back to back winners. They will want to make it a hat-trick of victories in this year’s series and they are in the top 3 favourites with the bookmakers to win. The Aussies also went undefeated in 34 consecutive World Cup matches until March 2011.
New Zealand
New Zealand last won this tournament in 2000 and in 2009 they came close to winning it for the second time before they were defeated in the final by Australia. The Black Caps’ are currently weighing up a recall for Jesse Ryder after he was dropped last March for breaking team protocol. He has a first-class average of 69.75 for his domestic side Willington this season and that’s the kind of form that could help them reach the Champions Trophy again this year.
Sri Lanka
The Sri Lankan cricket team have been a force to be reckoned with in recent years and they hold several world records, including world records for the highest team totals in all three forms to cricket, Test, ODI and Twenty20. They have consecutively reached the finals of the 2007 and 2011 Cricket World Cup but have ended up being runners up on both occasions, although they did win the World Cup back in 1996 as well as the ICC Champions Trophy in 2002.Sri Lanka are currently playing Australia in a series of ODI matches and in one of the matches managed to bowl Australia 40-9. First up for Sri Lanka is New Zealand at Cardiff on Sunday 9 June.
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There have been six Champions Trophy tournaments so far with the 2013 series being the seventh. The most recent tournament was 2009/10 where South Africa were the host nation after originally being organised to be in Pakistan, but was changed due to security concerns. After a number of nail-biting games, Australia successfully defended their title beating New Zealand with something to spare in the final. New Zealand had upset the form book by defeating Pakistan in the semi-finals aided by poor umpiring and dropped catches, unfortunately for New Zealand, their luck ran out in the final. Bookmakers are already offering odds for the 2013 champion with South Africa leading the way as favourite with England and Australia very close behind. Despite reaching the final of the last tournament, New Zealand are the outsiders to be victorious this year.
The 2013 ICC Champions Trophy will be the last time the tournament is played as the ICC moves towards having one championship for each of the game’s three formats from 2015. The tournament is part of the Future Tours Program in 2013 but does not appear after that, with the play-offs for the World Test Championship scheduled for June 2017.
