Football

ISL 2022-23: Indian Super League 2022-23 season to begin on October 7th, to be a 5 month football extravaganza

All the other editions in the ISL have only had a 2 month window.

Sep 1, 2022 6:16 pm

The Hero Indian Super League (ISL) edition of 2022-23 is set to be held on October 7th, 2022. Last season’s runners-up Kerala Blasters square off East Bengal FC at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium in Kochi in the opening game. The teams involved with the Hero ISL are currently playing it out in Asia’s oldest competition, the Durand Cup, as they prepare for the upcoming Hero ISL season.

The top brass of Indian Football are wanting to make a longer football schedule which gives players more exposure with more competitive matches to be played all year long. The Hero ISL will be succeeded by the Super Cup, which will be played in April 2023.

The ISL 2022-23 season will also be one where fans will throng in huge numbers to see their favourite stars and they will be welcomed back into stadiums after a two-year gap. The two previous editions were held in Goa under strict Bio Bubble supervision.

To make it a memorable experience for fans and families to come down and watch their teams play, the Hero ISL has made the list of fixtures with matches being played on weekends. The matches will happen between Thursday and Sunday, bringing the Hero ISL at par with the marquee global football leagues.

The new catch this season is that the Football Sports Development Limited (FSDL) has also done up a new playoff format for the league, adding two more exciting matches into the fixtures. The top two teams at the end of the league stage will have automatic qualification into the semi-finals. Teams which end up in between 3rd and 6th place will take part in a single-leg playoff to determine who the other two semi-finalists are.

This edition of the ISL has 117 matches of jaw-dropping football lined up. The Hero ISL is back to entertain its fans across ten venues around the country. For the first time ever, the league stage of the ISL will run for close to five months apart from the playoffs, semi-finals and final. Each club will play 20 league matches in total-10 each at home and away- across five months until the league stage ends on February 26th.