All about the Champions League

The tournament:

Involving 12 teams from seven countries, the Champions League T20 is the richest event of its type to hit the cricketing world. The teams include two each from England, Australia and South Africa (the champions and runners-up of their domestic T20 competition, one from Sri Lanka, New Zealand and the West Indies (champions of their domestic tournament) and three from India. Deccan Chargers and Royal Challengers Bangalore took the top two spots in the IPL to qualify while Delhi Daredevils gained their entry as they were the top team after the league stage of IPL II.

The teams:

India: Deccan Chargers, Royal Challengers Bangalore and Delhi Daredevils.
Australia: Victoria Bushrangers and New South Wales Blues.
England: Sussex Sharks and Somerset CCC.
South Africa: Cape Cobras,
Diamond Eagles.
Sri Lanka: Wayamba Eleven.
West Indies: Trinidad & Tobago
New Zealand: Otago Volts.

* The 12 teams have been divided into four groups of three teams each.
*Top two teams from  each group will qualify for the second league phase.
* In the second phase, the eight qualifiers from the first round will be divided into two groups in another round-robin phase.
* The top two from each group will advance to the semifinals.

The groupings:

GROUP A: Deccan Chargers (A1), Somerset CCC (A2),
Trinidad & Tobago (A3).
GROUP B: Diamond Eagles (B1), New South Wales Blues (B2),
Sussex Sharks (B3).
GROUP C: Royal Challengers Bangalore (C1), Otago Volts (C2),
Cape Cobras (C3).
GROUP D: Delhi Daredevils (D1), Victoria Bushrangers (D2),
Wayamba Eleven (D3).

* In a bid to avoid logistical hassles, the teams that move into the League Phase will maintain their nomenclature from the Group Stage as indicated in the groupings.
nPoint to be noted here is that A1 and A2 don't necessarily indicate which team has actually topped the group after the league phase. The 1, 2 and 3 are basically given for the sake of convenience.

* For example, in Group C Otago Volts (C3) finish on top followed by Royal Challengers Bangalore (C1) and Cape Cobras (C2), the Royal Challengers will continue to be called C1 while Volts will assume the position C2 (the qualifier assuming the name of the team that got eliminated).

* In the  League (second) Phase, each team will have to play the teams that it didn’t play during the Group Stage. The result of the Group Stage matches between the teams that qualify for the League Stage will be carried through to the League points table.

* League Phase grouping:

League A: A1, A2, B1, B2
League B: C1, C2, D1, D2