The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has announced an updated schedule for the international home season and South Africa A tour of India for 2025.
Team India (Senior Men) will be facing West Indies and South Africa across Test matches, One-Day Internationals (ODIs), and Twenty20 Internationals (T20Is) at home, with the IDFC First Bank Test series against West Indies starting on 2nd October in Ahmedabad.
The 2nd Test against West Indies, originally slated for Kolkata, will now be held at the Arun Jaitley Stadium in New Delhi.
Meanwhile, the 1st Test against South Africa, starting November 14, has been shifted from New Delhi to Eden Gardens in Kolkata.
The rest of the men’s international season schedule remains unchanged, though.
It is to be noted that giving New Delhi the first India-South Africa Test had raised huge concerns over its safe hosting and well-being of the players, considering that it was to be held three weeks after Diwali, which is typically a period when the entire Delhi-NCR region is engulfed in smog and high pollution.
Meanwhile, New Delhi will also be the host to the third India-Australia women’s ODI after the BCCI said the three-game series had to be moved out of Chennai due to the revamping of the outfield and pitches at the MA Chidambaram Stadium in Chennai.
The first two ODIs will now take place at the New PCA stadium in New Chandigarh, before the series-ending game is played in New Delhi. While this will be the first time New Chandigarh will host women’s international cricket, New Delhi will be back to hosting women’s ODI cricket after doing so in 1985 and 1995, respectively.
The BCCI further said the three one-day games between India ‘A’ and South Africa ‘A’, scheduled to be held from November 13-19, have been moved from M. Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bengaluru to the Saurashtra Cricket Association Stadium in Rajkot. The two multi-day matches between the two teams will be held at the BCCI Centre of Excellence (COE) in Bengaluru, as per the original itinerary.
