Bengal face Punjab in opening match

Kolkata:

Bengal

will kick-start the 75th National Football Championship for Santosh Trophy with a high-profile match against Punjan on April 16. The tournament-opener between the two former champions will be held at the Kottappadi Stadium in Malappuram. Kerala will host the championship round of the tournament in two venues in Malappuram, the

Manjeri

Payyanaad Stadium and the Kottappadi Stadium. The final will be held on May 2 at Manjeri. The main round of Santosh Trophy was originally scheduled for February but it was deferred because of the pandemic. Ten participating teams have been divided into two groups of five each, with the top two sides from each group making the semifinals, scheduled to be held on April 28 and 29.Apart from Punjab, Bengal have been grouped with Meghalaya, Rajasthan and Kerala. The other group consists of Gujarat, Karnataka, Odisha, Services, Manipur. Bengal under Ranjan Bhattacharya made the main round after beating

Chhattisgarh

and Sikkim in the qualifiers, held in Kalyani back in November last year.