London, Nov 08: The Oval, Edgbaston and Hampshire's Rosebowl will stage the International Cricket Council's Champions Trophy scheduled to be held next year. The event, to be hosted by the England and Wales cricket Board (ECB), will have 15 matches and will be played between September 10 to 25, the ECB and the ICC announced in a joint statement yesterday.

The tournament will feature 10 full members of the ICC and Kenya plus the winner of the ICC six-nation challenge to be held in the United Arab Emirates in March next year. Teams will be seeded for the tournament on the basis of their official one-day international rankings on December 01, 2003.

"Using the official ODI ratings is the fairest way to seed teams. This system ensures that all teams are treated in an equal manner as it provides an objective assessment of form over the last two to three years," ICC chief executive Malcolm Speed was quoted as saying by the statement. The format of the competition divides comprising teams into four groups of three, with the winners of each group progressing to the semi-finals.

The tournament has a total prize money of USD 1.25 million with USD 400,000 for the winners of the final -- an increase of USD 100,000 from the last time the tournament was held in Sri Lanka last year.

Bureau Report