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Chennai Super Kings v Royal Challengers Bangalore to kick off IPL 2019

The CSK team pose with the trophy BCCI

The 2019 IPL will begin with defending champions Chennai Super Kings taking on Virat Kohli's Royal Challengers Bangalore at the MA Chidambaram Stadium in Chennai on March 23.

The schedule for the first two weeks of the tournament was made public on Tuesday, listing out the first 17 matches, which will take place over two weeks. In this period, six of the teams will feature in four games apiece, with Bangalore and Delhi Capitals playing five of their league fixtures, and all teams will have two home fixtures, with only Delhi hosting three games.

Like it was in 2018, the IPL has stuck to keeping the double headers limited to the weekends, with three announced in the first two weeks' schedule. Incidentally, the start times for the afternoon and evening matches were not listed in the schedule.

The announcement from the IPL's governing body, though, came with a caveat: the dates are subject to changes, because the 2019 general elections across India are scheduled around the same time period.

"Once the election dates are released we will address any issues with the first two weeks and also prepare a schedule for the remainder of the season working with the local authorities around the polling dates," a statement on the IPL website said.

Click here for the IPL 2019 fixtures