The Twenty20 Champions League is an international tournament featuring the best teams of the domestic Twenty20 tournaments in various nations like Australia, England, India, South Africa, Sri Lanka, New Zealand and West Indies. The chairman of the event is Mr. Lalit Modi, the vice president of BCCI. It is organized by the cricket boards of India, Australia, South Africa, and England. The league has the backing of Internation Cricket Council (ICC).

The tournament was initially suggest by Mr Modi in 1996, but it was shot down then because it would go against the zonal system that the BCCI runs under. But with the success stories of domestic tourmanets specially Indian Premier Leauge(IPL) , the Twenty 20 champions league was announced in June 2008.

The inaugural tournament was to take place in India from late September to early October which was later postponed to October 2009.

The prize money for the tournament is $5 million, with winning team taking home a sum of $2 million.

A total of 12 teams will be playing for 2009 league. Top 3 teams of IPL, top 2 teams of Australia, England and South Africa and top teams from West Indies, New Zealand and Sri Lanka will take part in the tournament.

The teams are :