250 + colleges across 28 cities to compete : Red Bull Campus Cricket 2018

India, March 8, 2018: After a spectacular season in 2017, Red Bull Campus Cricket returns to bowl over budding cricketers in the country. Taking the competition up one more notch, the global T20 college cricket tournament has added two new cities to its roster and will witness the highest participation ever over 250 plus colleges across 28 cities.

Taking place from March 12 to the second week of April, the Red Bull Campus Cricket city qualifiers will start simultaneously in Indore, Dehradun & Kochi. Followed by Mumbai, Baroda, Ahmedabad, Pune, Nagpur and Goa in the West; along with Jalandhar, Delhi, Jaipur, Jammu, Chandigarh and Lucknow in the North; Chennai, Bangalore, Coimbatore, Hyderabad, Mysore and Vizag in South; and Kolkata, Raipur, Guwahati, Ranchi, Bhubaneshwar, Patna, Jamshedpur in the East.

The winning college from each city will then proceed to the zonal/regional finals in April. The top two teams from each zone will then compete in the National finals, where the teams will play in the knockout rounds of quarterfinals, semifinals and finals respectively. The National winner will then represent India in the Red Bull Campus Cricket World Series Championship 2018. Past winners from India that have gone on to represent the country at the World Championships are Rizvi College, Mumbai; DAV College, Chandigarh; Swami Shraddhanand College, Delhi; and MMC College, Pune.

Red Bull Campus Cricket is the only global T20 cricket tournament for university cricket teams, serving as an international platform for young and budding cricketers to showcase their talent and hone their skills. The tournament is now in its seventh year. Beyond 22 Yards is a video series that is inspired by stories in cricket, starting from the essentials of the bat and the ball, all the way to the highs of participating in an international tournament that becomes a dream come true for one college team from Pune, Maharashtra –https://www.redbull.com/in-en/beyond-22-yards

World Champions from six editions of Red Bull Campus Cricket are below.

*This was the Asia Cup, a tri-series competition between Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and India not a World Championship

Well-known Indian cricketers KL Rahul and Karun Nair have been associated with Red Bull Campus Cricket. “Red Bull Campus Cricket is very close to my heart and something I will remember till the end of time. This is where I revived my college cricket and found my lost confidence. And through this tournament I have found my way up.” Said Kannaur Lokesh Rahul, the top scorer in the Red Bull Campus Cricket Tournament’s India leg in 2013.

In his message to the young participants of the Red Bull Campus Cricket 2018 City Qualifiers, Red Bull Athlete KL Rahul said, “Go out there and play some tough cricket. There is a spirit of the game you want to follow, no matter whatever challenge you come up against. So perform to the best of your ability and play good cricket. Red Bull Campus Cricket gives young cricketers a stage to express themselves, and provides a fair idea of the profession as they go higher up”

Shradul Thakur, Manan Vohra, Siddhesh Lad, Himanshu Rana, Abhimanyu Easwaran, Anukul Roy, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Ricky Bhui are other well-known faces who played RBCC Cricket in the past and emerging stars in the Indian Cricket scene.

Anukul Roy in India’s Playing XI was the highest wicket taker and made a huge impact in the 2018 U19 cricket World Cup. He played RBCC National Finals last year, playing for Marwari College, Ranchi. Another Red Bull Campus Cricket alumnus Himanshu Rana also played for India at the 2018 Under-19 Cricket World Cup in New Zealand. As a student of New Delhi’s Swami Shraddhanand College, Rana participated in the 2015 edition of Red Bull Campus Cricket. He scored an unbeaten 86 in the New Delhi city finals to help his college team register a comfortable 55-run victory over Hindu College at the Bharat Nagar ground.