MOHALI, Sept 16: Still trying to find its foothold in the cricketing landscape, the Champions League Twenty20 will enter its fourth season on Tuesday with the qualifying matches during which Pakistan`s domestic champions Faisalabad Wolves are likely to hog the limelight.

A league which was born out of the hugely successful Indian Premier League, CLT20 is gradually establishing its identity but it would take some time for it to truly find a connect with the fans.

The event will kick off with Faisalabad Wolves, led by Pakistan`s Test skipper Misbah-ul-Haq, taking on New Zealand`s Otago Volts in the first qualifying match at the Punjab Cricket Association Stadium on Tuesday.

This would be followed by a starstudded Sunrisers Hyderabad, led by Indian opener Shikhar Dhawan, squaring off against Sri Lanka`s Kandurata Maroons in the second game.

Barring Volts, the other three teams in the qualifiers come from the sub-continent, but none among the four feels that either has any big advantage in the event.

The top two teams will advance to the main draw, which has three Indian teams in fray IPL champions Mumbai Indians, runners-up Chennai Super Kings and third-place finishers Rajasthan Royals.

In Tuesday`s opening match, the Wolves would mainly rely on their young players including promising medium-pacer Ehsan Adil, Ali Waqas, Khurram Shehzad, Asad Ali, besides banking on the experience of skipper Misbah and Saeed Ajmal, who has been a national asset in all three formats after his Test debut four years back.

The Wolves, who had some visa issues when they landed in India, will draw strength from the fact that at the domestic level, they beat teams that had many stars. The Wolves are only the second team from Pakistan to compete in the event after Sialkot Stallions last year.Their presence in the event was ensured after much speculation that arose out of rising border tensions between India and Pakistan.

The Wolves had been practicing hard back home for the tournament and familiar surfaces of the sub-continent would be a bonus for it.

Volts, who crashed out of the 2009 season by losing their first two matches, have the likes of swashbuckling skipper Brendon McCullum and brother Nathan McCullum to negate any advantage the other teams may get by virtue of familiar surfaces.

The Kiwis arrived here after a training camp in Sri Lanka to get used to the conditions.

`This is a tough qualifiers round.

Look at all the teams, they are all good on the paper. We know it is going to be tough for us to get past the qualifiers, McCullum said.

He said beating tough opponents will surely give them the confidence as they go ahead in the tournament. `The wicket is slightly faster and bouncierthan the normal Indian tracks, we can be confident that we have the right team to exploit the conditions.

In Tuesday`s second game the starstudded Sunrisers Hyderabad, featuring the likes of Parthiv Patel, Cameron White, Darren Sammy, Dale Steyn, Thisara Perera and Ishant Sharma, would aim for a win.

Dhawan, who was named as the side`s captain after Sri Lankan Kumar Sangakkara opted to play for the Maroons, has been in rollicking form, earning the Man-of-the-Series in the Champions Trophy in England.

The 27-year-old left-handed batsman feels captaincy is a new challenge and he is looking forward to it.

Sri Lankan Lahiru Thirimanne, captaining Kandurata Maroons, will take solace from the fact that the presence of international cricketers such as Kumar Sangakkara, Ajantha Mendis and Nuwan Kulasekara besides Rangana Herath, give his team a good balance of youth and experience.

`We are a young team but some ofour players are very experienced and that makes for a very good combination,` the Maroons skipper said.

Squads for the qualifiers: FAISALABAD WOLVES: Misbah-ul-Haq (captain), Asif Ali, All Waqas, Khurram Shehzad, llohammad Salman, Waqas llagsood, Samiullah Khan Niazi, Asad Ali, Saeed Ajmal, Ehsan Adil, Hasan llahmood, Rana Jahandad Khan, Farrukh Shchzad, Imran Khalid, Ammar Mahmood.

OTAGO VOLTS: Brendon 11cCullum (captain), Nicholas Beard, 11ichael Bracewell, Neil Broom, Ian Butler, Mark Craig, Derek de Boorder, Jacob Duffy, James McMillan, James Neesham, Aaron Redmond, IIamish Rutherford, Ryan ten Doeschate, Neil Wagner.

SUNRISERS ITYDERABAD: Shikhar Dhawan (captain), Parthiv Patel, Cameron White, J.P. Duminy, Dale Steyn, Darren Sammy, Biplab Samantray, Thisara Perera, Karan Sharma, Hanuma Vihari, Ashish Reddy, Ishant Sharma, Anand Rajan.

KANDURATA 11AROONS: Lahiru Thirimanne (captain), Nuwan Kulasekara, Upul Tharanga, Thilina Kandamby, Kumar Sangakkara, Shehan Jayasuriya, Chamara Silva, Milinda Siriwardene, Dilhara Lokuhettige, Dhammika Prasad, Ajantha Mendis, Kaushal Lokuarachchi, Lahiru Jayaratne, Dhananjaya de Silva, Suraj Randiv.

Tuesday`s fixtures (times PST): Faisalabad Wolves v Otago Volts (3:30pm) Sunrisers Hyderabad v Kandurata Maroons (7:30pm).-Agencies