From Tamil Nadu to Saurashtra: Know all Vijay Hazare Trophy winners

Saurashtra were crowned champions of the Vijay Hazare Trophy (VHT) 2022-23 after beating Maharashtra in the final at Ahmedabad. It marked the team’s second entry in the Vijay Hazare Trophy winners list.

Named after the legendary Indian cricketer Vijay Hazare, the 50-over format domestic tournament began in the 2002-03 season. Tamil Nadu, the inaugural champions, have won five titles, the most in Vijay Hazare Trophy history. 

Karnataka and Mumbai are joint-second with four titles. Meanwhile, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu are the only teams to have lifted two trophies on the bounce. The trophy was shared by Tamil Nadu and Uttar Pradesh in the 2004-05 season. Bengal have finished runner-up five times, the most in the competition.

Bengal, Railways, Delhi, Jharkhand, Gujarat, Saurashtra, and Himachal Pradesh have all won the title once each.

The tournament is organsed in a round-robin and playoff format, featuring 38 teams divided into six groups - five elite and one plate. The table-toppers of the five elite groups make the quarter-finals.

The five second-placed teams of the elite groups and the plate group topper play the pre-quarterfinals, with the winners sealing the remaining three quarter-final spots. Knockout games then decide the winner of the Vijay Hazare Trophy.

However, until the 2014-15 season, the tournament had 28 teams divided into five zonal groups - Central, North, South, East and West. While Central and North had six teams each, the other zones had five. The current format, having five elite groups and a plate group, came into existence in the 2018-19 season.

Meanwhile, in the first 2002-03 and 2003-04 seasons, a final round-robin stage for the zone toppers decided the winner.

Vijay Hazare Trophy winners list

Featured photo: Alamy