Last night, BCCI has announced two new teams of the Indian Premier League. They are the Lucknow franchise, owned by the RP Sanjiv Goenka Group, and the Ahmedabad franchise, owned by CVC Capital. With the induction of these two teams, IPL will have more league matches from next season. As per the official reports, there will be 74 matches in total from IPL 2022.
All ten teams will be divided into two groups comprising of five teams each. One team from a group plays two matches each with every other team of its group (one home and one away game). The same team plays one match each with the four teams of the other group (home or away) and two matches with the remaining team of the other group (home and away). In this way, every team gets a chance to play 14 games each.
For example, imagine Mumbai Indians, Royal Challengers Bangalore, Lucknow, Sunrisers Hyderabad, and Kolkata Knight Riders are in one group. Chennai Super Kings, Ahmedabad, Rajasthan Royals, Delhi Capitals, and Punjab Kings are in the other group. If that is the case, Mumbai will play two games each with RCB, SRH, Lucknow, and KKR (one home and one away). MI will play one game each with CSK, DC, PBKS, and RR (home or away). It will play two games with Ahmedabad (home and away). On the whole, MI will play 14 matches in total.
The top four teams on the points table will qualify for the playoffs. The playoff process will be the same as the previous editions.