Defending champions Karachi Blues, who fielded a stronger outfit last year, face a home tussle for supremacy against the traditionally senior strings - Karachi Whites here at the National Stadium.

Former Test batsman Asif Mujtaba, who led the Blues to the title in 1997-98, will be taking the reins of the Whites this season with another ex-international Sajid Ali as his deputy.

The secretary of the Karachi City Cricket Association (KCCA), Prof Sirajul Islam Bukhari, told Dawn on Friday, after the KCCA executive council met, that Saeed Azad and Iqbal Imam have been named as captain and vice-captain respectively of the Blues for the first two matches only. Any subsequent changes in the leadership will entirely depend on the performances of the individuals in question.

Mohammad Akram Khan is the manager for the Karachi Whites team with former first-class cricketer Zafar Ahmed as his deputy while Zaheeruddin has been named as manager of the Blues squad with Ali Imam as assistant manager.

Umpires Atiq Khan and Junaid Ghafoor will supervise the four-day match with Iqbal Sikander as the match referee.

Last season's runners-up Peshawar meet Islamabad at the Chaudhry Rehmat Ali (CRA) Ground in Islamabad. Sajjad Asghar and Iqbal Butt are the umpires while Farrukh Zaman is the match referee.

At the KRL Stadium in Rawalpindi, the hosts (Rawalpindi) take on Sargodha, who qualified to play in the Grade-I after winning the Grade-II championship last season. Said Shah and Mohammad Nazir Junior are the umpires with Naseer Malik as the match referee.

In the remaining two four-day matches, Bahawalpur clash with Lahore City at Rahim Yar Khan (Umpires: Salim Badar and Islam Khan. Match referee: Anwar Khan) while Faisalabad play Gujranwala at the Jinnah Stadium in Gujranwala (Umpires: Mian Mohammad Aslam and Saifullah. Match referee: Sultan Rana).

The format of the championship is more or less the same as last season with the top two teams on the points table in the 10-team tournament going straight into the five-day final.

Meanwhile, Prof Bukhari, who is also the chairman of the newly constituted Domestic Tournament Monitoring Committee (DTMC), has stated that any player who turns out for another side other than as a guest player from this season will not be eligible to represent his parent association for a period of two years.