After a much-anticipated new T20 cricket league, the T20 Global League, failed to materialise in 2017, Cricket South Africa went back to the drawing board and in October this year announced the exciting news that a new all-star cricket league, inspired by the massively popular Indian Premier League (IPL) and Australia's Big Bash, will be making its debut in South Africa this November and December.

The brand new Mzansi Super League (or MSL) is made up of six teams: the Jozi Stars, Durban Heat, Tshwane Spartans, Cape Town Blitz, Nelson Mandela Bay Giants and Paarl Rocks. Each team boasts a local and international marquee player while the rest of the squad comes from professional cricketers from South Africa's provincial cricket leagues and from overseas.

While many of the names on the Jozi Stars team will be unfamiliar to a lot of cricket fans, the team's two biggest stars are global household names and major fan favourites; Proteas fast bowler Kagiso Rabada and the 'Universe Boss' aka big hitting West Indian batsman Chris Gayle. Meanwhile recently retired Proteas legend and IPL mega-star AB de Villiers will be back at the South African crease playing in his hometown for the Tshwane Spartans at Centurion where he is joined by England skipper Eoin Morgan. View the full squad lists for the MSL 2018 here.

The schedule of matches happening at Joburg's Wanderers Stadium and at SuperSport Park in Centurion runs as follows:

Sun Nov 17 at 19:00 at Bidvest Wanderers Stadium: Jozi Stars vs Nelson Mandela Bay Giants
Sat Nov 24 at 19:00 at Bidvest Wanderers Stadium: Jozi Stars vs Cape Town Blitz
Sun Nov 25 at 11:00 at SuperSport Park, Centurion: Nelson Mandela Bay Giants vs Tshwane Spartans
Wed Nov 28 at 14:00 at SuperSport Park, Centurion: Jozi Stars vs Tshwane Spartans
Fri Nov 30 at 19:00 at Bidvest Wanderers Stadium: Durban Heat vs Jozi Stars
Sat Dec 1 at 19:00 SuperSport Park, Centurion: Cape Town Blitz vs Tshwane Spartans
Wed Dec 5 at 14:00 at SuperSport Park, Centurion: Paarl Rocks vs Tshwane Spartans
Sun Dec 9 at 11:00 at Bidvest Wanderers Stadium: Jozi Stars vs Paarl Rocks
Tue Dec 11 at 19:00 at Bidvest Wanderers Stadium: Jozi Stars vs Tshwane Spartans
Wed Dec 12 at 19:00 at SuperSport Park, Centurion: Durban Heat vs Tshwane Spartans

Fri Dec 14 at 19:00 at Bidvest Wanderers Stadium: Third place eliminator match

The final of the Mzansi Super League 2018 takes place at Newlands Cricket Ground in Cape Town on Sun Dec 16 at 15:30.