As one of cricket's most prestigious events, the ICC Champions Trophy sits alongside the World Cup as one of the two 'majors' of international cricket. The two tournaments are the only occasions on the cricket calendar when all 10 Test-playing nations come together to compete in the one event.

The fifth edition of ICC Champions Trophy, beginning in India October 7, has gained added appeal as all 10 countries will be using it as a dry run for the 2007 World Cup.

Just four months separate this biennial tournament and the World Cup, to be played in the West Indies in March-April, and the teams will be keen to settle their World Cup squads through the Champions Trophy, to be played in four cities for one month, ending with the final in Mumbai on November 5.

The final will be played at the Cricket Club of India's Brabourne stadium, in Mumbai, where international cricket returns at after 11 years.

Being staged in India for the first time, the ICC Champions Trophy provides teams the opportunity to benchmark their progress against each other with a format that has no leeway for mistakes. In contrast to the ICC Cricket World Cup, which provides an extended format of matches and allows teams the chance to recover from a defeat or slump in form, the ICC Champions Trophy demands consistency and the ability to generate winning performances from start to finish. With 21 games -- all day-night affairs -- in 30 days, one defeat is likely to prevent a team from progressing to the finals.

Originally introduced as the ICC knock-out tournament in 1998, the event has evolved into a round-robin competition with teams split into pool groups based on their official ICC one-day international rankings. In 2002, the tournament was renamed the ICC Champions Trophy to reflect the new competition format.

The Champions Trophy is the biggest tournament that India is hosting since the 1996 World Cup, which it jointly hosted with Pakistan and Sri Lanka.

SUMMARY OF TOURNAMENTS:

* India and Sri Lanka were declared joint winners after no result could be achieved in the final played twice

RESULT SUMMARY:

HIGHEST TEAM TOTALS:

Highest for other teams:

LOWEST TEAM TOTALS: