IND - Federation Cup tips off on Thursday

RAIPUR (Federation Cup) - The best teams in India's domestic leagues will do battle in the upcoming IMG-Reliance Federation Cup Championship for Men and Women in Raipur (Chhattisgarh) starting on Thursday.

The 25th edition of the competition will be played between 10th and 15th February and is organised by the Basketball Federation of India (BFI) in partnership with the Chhattisgarh Pradesh Basketball Association.

The Federation Cup features the top eight teams in both divisions (men and women) from the previous year's Senior National Basketball Championship.

The teams competing in this year's tournament are:

MEN
1. Indian Railways
2. Tamil Nadu
3. Uttarakhand
4. Services
5. Andhra Pradesh
6. Chhattisgarh
7. Karnataka
8. Kerala

WOMEN
1. Indian Railways
2. Delhi
3. Chhattisgarh
4. Karnataka
5. Kerala
6. Tamil Nadu
7. Maharashtra
8. Andhra Pradesh

The host team qualifies automatically – this year, hosts Chhattisgarh already fell in the top-eight of both divisions.

The Men and Women’s teams from Punjab will not be participating, and have been replaced by Kerala (Men) and Andhra Pradesh (Women).

The 24th edition of the Federation Cup was held at Alwar (Rajasthan) between 22nd and 26th October 2009. ONGC (Uttrakhand) were men's champions while SEC (Indian Railways) won the women’s division.

For more information, go to www.indiabasketball.org

FIBA