Courtesy: BCCI/X
On Monday, October 7, Cricket Hong Kong announced that the Indian cricket team will be playing the Hong Kong Sixes tournament for the first-time in 12 years. The latest edition of the Hong Kong Sixes tournament will be its first in seven years, which will be going down from November 1 to 3 in Hong Kong, China, with 12 teams participating in it, including the hosts, the Indian cricket team, their arch-rivals Pakistan, and some of the other prominent cricket nations in the world.
The six-a-side Hong Kong Sixes tournament, known for its blitz hitting, will also have the likes of Australia, Bangladesh, England, Nepal, New Zealand, Oman, South Africa, Sri Lanka, and the United Arab Emirates competing for the title. The first edition of the tournament was played in 1992, and following a long hiatus of seven years, its return is set to happen in the year 2024, as per the report from the Indian Express.
India have won the Hong Kong Sixes tournament in 2005
Over the illustrious history of the Hong Kong Sixes tournament, the most successful teams include names like South Africa, England, and Pakistan, while the countries like India, Sri Lanka, Australia, and West Indies are also the former champions as well. Some of the greatest cricketers to grace the Hong Kong Sixes tournament include names like Sachin Tendulkar, MS Dhoni, Anil Kumble, Shane Warne, Glenn Maxwell, Wasim Akram, Shoaib Malik, and Sanath Jayasuriya, among others.
A Hong Kong Sixes tournament match involves a maximum of five overs of batting for each team boasting six players, although for the final, each over will consist of eight balls instead of six. If the five wickets fall prior to the stipulated five overs of a team’s innings are bowled, then the last dismissed batter will act as a runner while the unbeaten batter gets to take strike until his dismissal, which will mark the end of the team’s innings.
Furthermore, a batter is forced to retire after scoring 31 or more runs, but he can take the strike if the rest of his teammates have either been dismissed or retired.
