India win the T20I World Cup - 2026 - India’s Cricket Empire: World Cup Glory, IPL Power, and the Rise of a Sporting Superpower

So the dust has finally settled, and the Indian cricket team has achieved something that had never been done before. They have not just repeated history, they have rewritten it. Along the way, they set a plethora of records that may stand untouched for years.

This is now the only team to have won a T20 World Cup at home. The only team to have successfully defended a T20 World Cup title. The only team to have won three T20I World Cups. And consistency? India has won 31 matches and lost just two across the last four ICC tournaments, lifting three ICC trophies in a row. Add to that the highest totals ever recorded in both the semi-finals and finals of a T20 World Cup, and you begin to see the scale of dominance.

But this piece is not merely about cricketing records. It is about the rise of a nation that has become both an economic and sporting colossus in the world of cricket. India’s dominance in the global cricket economy is no accident. The country’s expanding economic strength appears to be rubbing off on its sporting ecosystem. Financial muscle is translating into administrative power, broadcast leverage, infrastructure, talent systems, and ultimately, on-field results.

India, with its enormous population base, has hit a sporting sweet spot. A cricket-crazy nation has embraced the T20 format like a duck takes to water. The format perfectly matches the pulse of the Indian audience. It plays out like a typical Hindi blockbuster, packed with action, glamour, drama, noise, colour, and celebration. It is loud, emotional, and designed for entertainment.

Matches begin around 7:00 pm and end by 10:30 pm, ideal for prime-time family viewing and social gatherings. It fits seamlessly into India’s party culture: friends gathering, food flowing, conversations buzzing, celebrations erupting, and yes, a fair share of competitive banter and fantasy gaming adding spice to the experience.

The rise of the IPL perfectly complements this T20 surge. Consider the timing. India are the reigning T20 World Cup champions, and within days the next IPL season begins. The cricketing high simply does not fade. The emotional momentum flows from national glory straight into franchise passion.

And it is not just India waiting. The entire cricketing world tunes in. International stars from Australia, England, South Africa, New Zealand, and the Caribbean descend on India to compete for IPL glory. Global rivalries blend with local loyalties. National pride merges with franchise identity. The IPL becomes a melting pot of world cricket.

Look at the composition of IPL squads and you will understand the scale of strength. Mumbai Indians boast multiple World Cup heroes including Jasprit Bumrah, Suryakumar Yadav, Tilak Varma and Hardik Pandya, along with Rohit Sharma, practically the spine of the championship-winning side. Sunrisers Hyderabad feature Abhishek Sharma and Ishan Kishan. Kolkata Knight Riders include Varun Chakravarthy and Rinku Singh. Gujarat Titans have Mohammed Siraj and Washington Sundar. Delhi Capitals field Axar Patel and Kuldeep Yadav. Chennai Super Kings showcase Shivam Dube and Sanju Samson. Punjab Kings rely on Arshdeep Singh.

Almost every IPL franchise is sprinkled with World Cup-winning stars. Add to that elite overseas players from top cricketing nations, and the squads begin to look stronger than many international teams. One could argue that several IPL sides are more formidable than national teams outside the “Big Three”.

That is the true power of the IPL ecosystem. The brilliance of the league lies in competitive balance. Teams are evenly matched, making contests unpredictable and thrilling. This parity is no accident. IPL architects carefully designed auction systems, salary caps, and player distribution rules to prevent talent hoarding.

Contrast this with leagues like the English Premier League, where financial heavyweights such as Manchester City, Manchester United, Liverpool FC, and Arsenal FC often dominate due to massive financial disparities, leaving smaller clubs struggling to compete consistently.

The IPL’s rule allowing only four overseas players in the playing XI ensures global quality without compromising domestic opportunity. Seven slots remain for Indian talent in every team. With ten franchises, that creates opportunities for 70 Indian cricketers each season.

This has produced an extraordinary talent pipeline. India now has such depth that it can field separate high-quality squads simultaneously in Tests, ODIs, and T20Is. In fact, India’s second-string white-ball teams could realistically compete with and often outperform, the full-strength national sides of several countries, including Australia, England, and South Africa.

That depth is not accidental. It is the outcome of exposure, pressure, infrastructure, analytics, sports science, financial incentives, and constant competition at the highest level. Now let us shift to the commercial powerhouse behind this cricketing dominance, the money machine of global tournaments.

The 2026 ICC Men’s T20 World Cup is poised to become the first edition in history to cross $1 billion (Rs 9,000 crore) in total revenue. Hosted by India and Sri Lanka, the tournament has been driven by record-breaking broadcast rights, premium sponsorships, and unprecedented advertising demand.

Broadcaster JioStar alone is expected to contribute nearly 90% of total revenues through its domestic media rights in India. Advertising collections are projected at approximately Rs 2,500 crore.

Television ad rates for the final have surged beyond Rs 50 lakh for a 10-second slot across HD and SD feeds, a staggering 42% increase from early tournament rates. Even the India–Pakistan blockbuster had earlier peaked at Rs 40 lakh per 10 seconds.

And the surge is not confined to television. Connected TV advertising rates jumped from roughly Rs 600 to Rs 1,000 (CPM) per 10 seconds. Digital ad pricing climbed nearly 30%, proving that advertisers are chasing audiences across every screen.

Viewership figures reinforce this commercial explosion. The first 49 matches delivered a cumulative television reach of 275 million viewers in India alone. The India–England semi-final crossed an astonishing 580 million viewers. Overall Indian viewership has already crossed 500 million, making this the most-watched T20 World Cup ever.

Digital streaming has multiplied accessibility, especially among younger audiences consuming cricket via mobile devices and smart TVs. Sponsorship revenues are equally massive. The ICC is projected to earn more than $110 million from on-ground branding, central partnerships, and licensing deals.

Prize money has also reached historic levels, with a $13.5 million pool (₹120+ crore) and $3 million reserved for the champions. Individual matches dramatically influence revenue flows. A single India–Pakistan game can generate more than $250 million for broadcasters. Conversely, the absence of such marquee clashes may reduce ad revenues by 15–20%.

Yet, despite these extraordinary figures, the T20 World Cup differs from the IPL in commercial structure. Only about 10–15 matches, India games, Super 8 contests, semi-finals, and the final, generate peak advertising interest. The IPL, in contrast, offers nearly two months of consistent high-engagement cricket with strong teams playing daily, making it a more stable platform for long-duration brand campaigns.

Even so, global tournaments deliver unmatched intensity, prestige, and premium pricing power within a shorter window. Earlier T20 World Cups saw television ad rates of Rs 20–25 lakh for a 10-second slot. Today’s numbers tell a clear story: as cricket becomes shorter, faster, and more dramatic, advertising value rises exponentially.

Cricket is no longer just a sport. In India, it is emotion, economy, entertainment, and national identity woven into one unstoppable force. 

#IndiawinsT20Iworldcup2026 #IndianCricket #CricketBusiness #SportsEconomy #SportsMarketing #T20WorldCup2026 #IPL #BrandIndia #SportsIndustry #MediaRights #BroadcastIndustry #SportsManagement #CricketFans #DigitalStreaming #SportsAnalytics #BusinessOfSports #SportsLeadership #EventMarketing #SportsRevenue #GlobalSports #IndiaGrowthStory

Primary Keywords: Indian cricket dominance, India T20 World Cup victory, Indian cricket team records, IPL and Indian cricket economy, Business of cricket in India, India cricket superpower, T20 cricket popularity in India, Indian Premier League strength, ICC tournaments India performance and Cricket revenue in India. 

Secondary Keywords:  India cricket commercial success, T20 World Cup advertising revenue, IPL business model success, Indian cricket financial power, Sports economy India cricket, Cricket broadcasting rights India, Cricket sponsorship revenue ICC, India cricket fan base growth, Rise of T20 cricket India, India cricket global influence, IPL vs international cricket revenue, Indian cricket talent depth, Cricket viewership India records, Sports marketing through cricket, Indian cricket brand value, Cricket media rights billion dollar deals, India Pakistan match ad revenue, T20 World Cup business analysis, Indian cricket future prospects and Economics of modern cricket. 

Darren Sammy the west Indian cricket player calls SRH racist - the pot calling the kettle black

07-06-2020

Sammy the ex-West Indies cricket player suddenly understanding  "Kallu meant black" when he was playing for Sunrisers Hyderabad during his IPL playing days is extremely amusing, to say the least. 

Most cricket players including foreign players are ribbed mercilessly by all crowds including the Indian spectators. Most take it as par for the course and bear it as IPL is a gravy train that no one wants to miss. 

Now that his IPL days are over Sammy is suddenly critical of SRH. Any how Sammy, even in West Indies cricket racism exists in another form.

Indian origin cricketers who played for West Indies are derided and Keith Arthurton once called an Indian origin cricket player a "bloody coolie" and got away with it. 

And recently another West Indies cricket star Chris Gail ripped into Ram Naresh Sarwan and called him  "a snake and worse than a Corona Virus". Well well, Sammy it is like the proverb  "the pot calling the kettle black (pun unintended)!"

BCCI sets the base price of Rs 33,000/- crores (4.38 Billion US Dollars) as base price for media rights - IPL 2023-2027

BCCI sets the base price of Rs 33,000/- crores (4.38 Billion US Dollars) as media rights for the next cycle of 2023-2027 editions of IPL. 

This is only the base price and the final bidding amount could be twice or even trice this amount. 

Don't be surprised if the final media rights amount touches the magical Rs 1,00,000/- crores for five years. That is a whopping 20,000/- crores for one-year media rights. 

According to "The Times newspaper" quote For the 2022 to 2025 rights cycle, The international deals will be worth UK£5.3 billion (US$7.1 billion), up 30 percent, while domestic deals bring in UK£5.1 billion (US$6.9 billion), with commercial partnerships taking the total to UK£10.5 billion (US$14.2 billion, Rs 1,00,707 crores) unquote. 

This is amazing. IPL with a limited footprint will challenge EPL, the behemoth. EPL is followed throughout the world and it had a headstart. EPL started in 1992 and IPL only in 2007. 

Even though started 15 years late, IPL has caught up. Remarkable marketing and it is astonishing to see how T20 cricket caught the imagination and pulse of the people. 

With so much money BCCI dictates the cricket world including bossing over the ICC. 

PCB (Pakistan Cricket Board) must be green with envy. They can't get a pie from this cake and rubbing salt in the wound, their players are not even allowed to play! 

But so much money can harm the sport. For example, in soccer, the clubs dominate the scene, and club owners and managers reluctantly release the star players for national duty. 

In the coming years, we can expect IPL to be long drawn out affair like the EPL. Maybe 20 teams will participate (allow one team from each major city in India) and more money will roll in!. 

Make the players play 10 tests, 20 ODI, and 30 T20I per year in a 3 or 4-month window that BCCI will allow. I am sure all boards expect PCB will happily lap this offer and make even more money. 

According to "The Times newspaper" quote For the 2022 to 2025 rights cycle, The international deals will be worth UK£5.3 billion (US$7.1 billion), up 30 percent, while domestic deals bring in UK£5.1 billion (US$6.9 billion), with commercial partnerships taking the total to UK£10.5 billion (US$14.2 billion, Rs 1,00,707 crores) unquote.

This is amazing. IPL with a limited footprint will challenge EPL, the behemoth. EPL is followed throughout the world and it had a headstart. EPL started in 1992 and IPL only in 2007.

 Even though started 15 years late, IPL has caught up. Remarkable marketing and it is astonishing to see how T20 cricket caught the imagination and pulse of the people.

It is all about money honey.

Yashasvi Jaiswal, the unsung hero, IPL

 

How lucky, Yashasvi Jaiswal! Just 19 years old. Comes from a poor background. Slept in a tent on a cricket field, sold Paani Puri, and dreamt about playing for India.

Wish with my whole heart that he plays for India. But what a debut! Debuts today and playing along with him is Steve Smith, one of the Fab four.

Behind him keeping stumps is Dhoni, a cricketing legend. And very soon he will be up against Virat Kholi, Kane Williamson the other two of the Fab four. The only person that he will not be playing against among the Fab four is Joe Root.

And he will be rubbing shoulders with Ben Stokes, Robin Uttappa, Jos Buttler, Jofra Archer in his own dressing room.

IPL's beauty is not the glamour or fast cricket, it is about allowing young cricketers to play with and against some of the greatest players who have graced cricket in the last twenty years. He will see in blood cricket legends like Chris Gayle and Russel Arnold.

Go ahead and enjoy yourself, Yashasvi Jaiswal. You have been given admission to learn from the Harward University of cricket. Learn and learn well. The lessons that you will learn will be useful in your career.

exciting new times for tracking TV viewership

For a long time, TV viewership details were a lot of hocus pocus. It was imagination and conjecture. However, technology and cutting the cord by the young netizens has led to some fascinating insights. Many of us are exasperated by the antics of satellite channels who want to charge for every channel separately.

Now we have an option. We can shift to online streaming platforms. Hotstar live streams EPL and PKL, Sony Liv, is streaming India tour of West Indies and Australia tour of England.

The most exciting part is when live sports get streamed on Hotstar a ticker that shows the number of people watching the telecast at the exact point of time.

When India played New Zealand in the cricket world cup, the ticker went crazy, 13.5 million watched the contest that is a whopping 1.3 crore Indians!

However, the finals did not even get a fraction of that viewership. India rules online streaming platforms.

Last Sunday the blue boys of world football Manchester United played the Wolves, and only 65,000 Indians watched the match!

Today when Tamil Thalivars are playing Jaipur Pink Panthers in the Professional Kabbadi League (PKL) a whopping 6.14 lakh people are watching! In India, kabbadi is the second most liked sports, at least in the online platforms. 

Moreover, these are only preliminary matches and imagine what will happen when the PKL season progresses. In future, PKL will challenge Indian cricket and IPL in the popularity charts.

Wish that Sony Liv also gives us ticker details of the number of viewers watching the telecast. Very exciting for marketing professional and marketing teachers and analysts. These are hard dynamic stats getting displayed right in front of our eyes. Wow, I love it.

Name sake Competitors or Partners Planning for Market Domination!

Marketers always talk of competitors as being fierce and at each other’s throats. There is a saying "everything is fair in war and love". But is not really true. Most of it is only sparring. Check out what is happening on TV.

India Vs South Africa cricket series is playing out in South Africa and all other sports channels will try to divert our attention to their own programmes. They will show any other cricket match that is as close to India vs South Africa match as possible. Not that the viewers get confused easily, but it is par for the course.

Star Sports and Star Cricket are desperately trying to milk their contract with IPL for the next five years. They already have had prelude for the IPL auctions for 2018 season. They will try to prolong the auction process and the aftermath as much as possible. Trying to milk IPL when the Indian national team is playing does not cut much ice with the audience.  But they have nothing to lose and everything to gain, right!

But the TV channels are not really competitors! When one channel takes a commercial break – check out any other similar channel. All of them will be playing commercials. So as far as getting money from the advertisers all of them are on the same platform or frequency!

Most competition simply, is at the vey basic level and it is to get market share. Most companies maintain some sort of a status quo. When a huge controversy erupted in 2006 about presence of pesticide in Indian soft drinks, both Pepsi and Coca-Cola’s CEOs came on the same platform to address a joint press conference!

Yes, you have read it right! Pepsi and Coke on the same platform. And both companies proudly say in their advertisements that the cola wars are on and that they would not even utter each other’s names!

There was lot of back patting in that press conference and both the CEOs in unison were very magnanimous in declaring that their colas are absolutely safe. They finally hinted not so subtly that it is actually the contaminated ground water of India that is responsible for the pesticide in the colas and not their production process or their ingredients! And we continue to patronize the colas! Caveat Emptor! 

The world most beautiful game - Football and Ethiopia - Made for each other - Ethiopian Journey - Blog Post no - 20

Ethiopian Kids Playing Football

But the game that all the Ethiopians love is Football. For the slim built Ethiopians, playing football comes naturally. They play with anything including cloth rags rounded up as a ball. They can play football continuously and with great élan.  It was a truly fascinating seeing the agility, the body feints and dodges. Football and Africans are made for each other.

Waiting to Get inside 

The passion for football cuts across all demographics like age, class, ethnicity and gender. Ethiopia at that time in 2002 had a magic wand that made it popular with the football crazy Bahirdar residents. Ethiostar had a dish antennae that could beam Super Sports channel. 

EPL, English Premier League

Super Sports has the rights to beam live EPL (English Premiership league) matches. English Premiership League is an England based soccer league that features world class football stars who play for legendary football clubs. EPL is the 4^th most watched sports league in the world.  EPL matches are usually played on Saturday, Sunday and sometimes on Thursday.

IPL, Indian Premier League

According to the same post IPL (Indian Premier League) stands sixth in the list of most watched sports leagues in the world. And Indians should be proud of the fact that IPL is only ten years old whereas the other sports leagues have had a head start. If sheer number of people watching the sport on Television is taken as measure, IPL would be head and shoulder above the other leagues.  Millions of viewers watch matches across India and in many other countries. Many leading cricket players from other countries play in IPL and this had generated lot of spectator interest for IPL across the world.

One advantage India has is its population. Only China could have given it a run for its money. But China has wisely opted out of the race. India very soon will have the dubious distinction for being the most populous country in the world.

The per capita income of Ethiopians in 2000 was around three birr/day. That is slightly less than eighteen rupees. But most poor and underprivileged, earned between one and two birr per day. Before we all become teary eyed and sentimental, let us look at hard facts.

Let me work out the math for you. One birr had lot of purchasing power (one birr = 100 santims). For sixty santims one could get an Injira, fifteen santims could buy a Shai and at the end of the day with the 25 santims remaining, one could buy a glass of Talla (a yellow frothy ethnic Ethiopian beer)! Not bad!

So from an Ethiopian view point, a birr is a lot of money. On Saturday and Sunday, the locals come in hordes to Ethiostar. They dress nattily and are in joyous mood. They pay two birr (that is their one day salary) and get into the dining area and settle into the chairs. They patiently wait for an event that they anticipated for an entire week. Then the TV set flicks on and their favourite EPL match comes on - and it is LIVE. They start screaming, hollowing and enjoying themselves. This continues for the entire duration of the match.

CSK wins the IPL 2011 - End of a well orchestrated campaign

Finally the curtains have rung down on the IPL 2011. As expected it was a blockbuster all the way. The spectators, viewers, sponsors and all concerned had a gala time. Chennai Super kings (CSK) and Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) clashed in the finals and CSK came out the winner.  

Let us analyze the CSK success second time running. The strategy of CSK was very clear right from the start. Unlike the other Franchisees CSK believed in putting cricket before the lucre of money. They retained 3 Indian players M. S. Dhoni, Suresh Raina and Murali Vijay (All three Indian test players) and one foreign player Albie Morkel. They used up their entire quota of retaining players.  CSK very reluctantly let Michael Hussey go to the auctions.

This is in stark contrast of Deccan chargers (DC) who did not retain even their IPL winning captain Adam Gilchrist. The league almost saw DC finishing at the bottom. Only a late surge saw the chargers finishing at a respectable seventh place.

CSK played it cool at the auctions. They did not bid for Muralidharan and Muralidharan faded right out and took only two wickets for his team the Kochi Tuskers. Similarly Hyden, Jacob Oram, Justin Kemp, Ntini and Parthiv Patel were of no interest to the CSK.

CSK later grabbed Michael Hussey at a cheap price of 425,000 US $. Similarly they bought Doug Bollinger at a price of 700,000 US $ and Dwayne Bravo at a price of 200,000 US $. CSK quietly bought up their earlier team mates like Badrinath, Ashwin, Tyagi, George Bailey, Jakati, Srikanth Anirudha and Joginder Singh.

This way CSK retained 12 of its players who played for it in the first three editions. M. S. Dhoni, Suresh Raina, Murali Vijay, Albie Morkel, Michael Hussey,  Badrinath, Ashwin, Tyagi, George Bailey, Jakati, Srikanth Anirudha and Joginder Singh.

And very interestingly 8 of the 11 players who were either retained or were procured again played in the finals of the IPL 2011. The eight who played the final are M. S. Dhoni , Suresh Raina, Murali Vijay, Albie Morkel, Michael Hussey, Badrinath, Ashwin,  Jakati. The other three who played in the finals are Doug Bollinger, Dwayne Bravo and Wriddiman Saha.

With such amazing home work it is of no great surprise that CSK performed so well in the IPL. CSK is the only team that made it to all the four semifinals. It played three finals and won two of them.

M. S. Dhoni proved to be a brilliant captain. He nursed young played like Murali Vijay and Ashwin almost with a missionary zeal. Murali Vijay easily outshone Chris Gayle. Murali is not flamboyant like Gayle but sealed the final with his sparkling 95. The other of the Dhoni’s favorite Ashwin finished off the match with his first over where he snapped up Chris Gayle for a naught. Game set and match for M.S. Dhoni.

Dhoni proved to be a brilliant tactician too. He chose to bat first in the final and showed enormous confidence in Vijay and Ashwin. Sachin the  great player that he is proved to be a very poor tactician. In the Mumbiaya mould that he is born with Sachin tried to play safe. We can’t really blame him. Sachin is very influenced by  the great Sunil Gavaskar the great defensive captain.

In the Qualifier Sachin won the toss and elected to field. Instead of paying to his team’s strength he tried to play to his opponent’s weakness. Unlike Dhoni who opened with Ashwin, Sachin tried to hide his best bowler Lasith Malinga. The first over bowled by Mumbai in the second qualifier effectively finished the match. Chris Gayle took the bowler to the cleaners and scored 27 runs. Albeit in the same way Dhoni ensured that the finals finished his way by seeing that Chris Gayle gets out in RCB’s first over itself.

CSK played with a swagger of kings that they were. The other finalist of the last year Mumbai Indians always had a scowl on their face. Their new recruits like Symonds, Rayudu and Suman did not live up to the billing. It is time that Sachin gave up the lucrative 2020 IPL and concentrate on test cricket completely. It is a travesty of justice to miss Sachin for the forthcoming Windies test tour.

Come on Sachin let go of the money. You have nothing to prove. Lest of all trying to win  a lottery called IPL. You are not cut out for it. It is better to you to give your remaining years to test cricket. You would be remembered for your contribution for test and one day cricket and not for your contribution for the bang bang thank you mam version of cricket which is what IPL is.

Tail Piece: The purple cap for the best bowler went to Lasith Malinga with 28 wickets and the Orange cap for the best batman went to Chris Gayle with 608 runs. Lasith Malinga’s team finished third and Chris Gayle’s team finished second.

The winners CSK had their man Ashwin finishing as the 4^th best bowler with 21 wickets. Similarly their best batsman Michael Hussey finished as the 5^th best batsman with 492 runs. It proves the point that cricket is still a team sport even in the 2020 format. No room for the prima Donnas.

Cloak and Dagger style functioning of IPL franchisees!

Laxshmipathy Balaji

Saurav Ganguly

Mohammed Kaif

 Can we blame the football and cricket players for all the bad things in EPL and IPL? They are only trying to maximize their earning capacity. We had the case of the Sri Lankan cricketers giving up on an English tour and playing in the IPL. Big players like Gilchrist, Hayden, Shane Warne have retied prematurely so that they can extend their careers and play in the lucrative IPL. The case of travel weary Australians landing up in various Indian cities to represent their franchises is reflecting the way things will shape out in the future. 

The first match of the IPL series four had an interesting side light. Harsha Bogle was interviewing Anirudha the Chennai Super Kings player and asked him whether the word traitor was mentioned when Laxmipathy Balaji was seen by CSK players. Why traitor? Poor Balaji played for CSK for three years and later went on to Kolkata Knight Riders for the fourth season.

Harsha was insinuating that Balaji being a local player has betrayed Chennai by playing for Kolkata. Come on Harsha you should know better. Poor Balaji I am sure did have a choice and had to take what was offered to him. We are not privy to any information as to whether it was Balaji who opted out or if was CSK who opted not to retain him. I am betting my bottom dollar that it was CSK who let Balaji go and not the other way round.  

The players are very small pawns in the entire IPL game. A player like Saurav Ganguly did not get a bid and Mohammed Kaif was only taken up only in the last minute. Pakistani players not even considered. They were not considered even when they won the 20 20 world cup! There were no instructions from BCCI but mysteriously none of the franchisees bid for even one Pakistani cricket player. And all the franchisees say that they are independent. Their functioning certainly does not merit such a claim.

IPL going the EPL way?

The way IPL is going things are getting very worrisome. The crassness of the entire thing is now frightening. More of that later. The thing that I am interested in whether commercialization helps the development of the sport in the country. Does hosting EPL and IPL and getting famous players to play in the country help the game of Football in England and Cricket in India. EPL is played in England and IPL is played in India. IPL is very new for any type of research.

So I took the case of the English Premier League. The league is so popular that In African Countries people wait for an entire week to see the clash between Manchester United and Arsenal and pay an astronomical amount to watch a live telecast. The league has billions of followers and is very lucrative. But has it benefitted the country that is England where the league is played? The League was started in the year 1992 and check out for yourself the English national team’s performance in all the FIFA football world cups from 1990.

FIFA worlds Cup               England Team performance

1990                                                       4th

1994                                                       DNQ (Did not qualify)

1998                                                       9th

2002                                                       6th

2006                                                       7th

2010                                                       13th

2014                                                       26th

2018                                                       4^th

England’s best performance came in the year 1990. That was in the year when there was no Premiership league. England did not even qualify for the 1994 world cup, Finished 9^th, 6^th, 7^th, and 13^{th in} the later world cups. They made it to the pre-quarter-finals on two occasions and quarterfinals in two other. Not very flattering for a country that boasts of the richest football league. In contrast, Brazil does not have a great football league but continues to produce the greatest footballers in the world.

So what did EPL achieve? Lots of money for the clubs, TV channels, and the players. The players have benefited so much all the footballers are any how famous, even their WAGS (wives and girl friends) too are featured in page 3 of major newspapers. But apart from this nothing else has been achieved. The footballers have become more loyal to their clubs than the country that they represent. There are occasions when the players have not been relieved from national duty by the club or have feigned injuries so that they don’t have to attend coaching camps for major national events. 

CCL ( Celebrity Cricket League) competition for IPL (Indian Premier league)

Vishnu, son of Mohan Babu the Telugu film actor was on the television the other night. He was talking about the professional cricket league that the film stars wants to start and run. He called it the CCL.

Film stars are coming together to form the Celebrity Cricket League (CCL) similar to IPL. In this league of CCL, star cricketers from all the industries will take part. The teams are titled as Bollywood (Mumbai Heroes), Tollywood (Telugu Tigers), Sandalwood (Bangalore Stars) and Kollywood (Tamil Superstars). During the CCL six league matches will be conducted and one final. The final winning team will receive 25 lakhs as the prize money.

 

This sounded very strange and funny. Readers especially readers who are acquitted with strategic management would immediately recall a concept called core competence. A film star to talk about cricket and talk about launching a professional cricket league like the IPL is very strange and borders on exotic day dreaming.

Cricketers playing professional cricket is like Sachin romancing Aishwarya Rai on the big screen and saying that his movie is in direct competition with a blockbuster from ShahRukh Khan. Come on Vishnu, we know that you make dreams. But these dreams should be made for others. Please do not believe in those dreams. Because the market conditions will bring you back to the earth.

Yes there would be a novelty factor of watching film stars play may be for one time. But I seriously doubt if anyone would like to see the antics of Vishnu, Bala Krishna, Pawan, Kalyan, Nagarjuna or any other  film star more than once. Yes they say that Akhil (son of Nagarjuna) is a very good cricket player- but all the reports that Akhil being a good player has come from the film press and not by any serious sports commentator or any cricket journalist.

But this fallous thinking that because you are good at one thing you would be good at everything has been proved wrong many times. Many famous personalities have tried proving it correct at their own peril. We can remember Salim Durrani, Sunil Gavaskar, Sandeep Patil, and Vinod Kambli who acted in movies. Needless to say all their movies bombed at the box office.

The only sensible super star who stayed away from the glitter of the bollywood is Sachin Tendulkar. I am sure he was offered many roles but he was steadfast in refusing to act in any one of them. Sachin is so humble that he refused to act in an advertising film that asked him to hit sixes with a cricket bail.

He is reported to have said that he would not do it as that would mean that he is bigger than the game of cricket itself. Finally he relented and allowed the advertising film to be made with a cricket stump. That is Sachin is shown hitting sixes with a cricket stump. There are so many lessons we can learn from Sachin Tendulkar.

Deccan Chargers, why not Hyderabad Deccan Chargers? VVS Laxman's shoddy treatment

Keeping to the same topic as my previous post why is that all the other franchisees use the name of their city before their name like Bangalore Royal challengers, Kolkata Knight riders, Delhi Dare Devils etc and only Deccan chargers does not use the city name?. Do Deccan chargers belong only to Deccan Chronicle? No it does not. I as a true blue blooded Hyderabadi object strongly to Deccan Chargers being called by that name. Deccan Chargers should change their name to Hyderabad Deccan Chargers. This way the Deccan chargers will respect the city to which they belong.

Deccan chargers should have retained VVS Laxman. Their argument was that Laxman has outlived his utility. Deccan chargers management should realize that money is not everything in life.  They have lost VVS Laxman in the very year that he got his Padmashree. Deccan you have lost the photo opportunity of the century!.!Like they say Deccan Chargers loss is Kochi’s gain. Sorry to see you go VVS. You have been an inspiration. Especially after you refused to be called a legend and made yourself a part of the regular team. VVS you have proved a point that even the great Sachin Tendulkar did not or could not. Hats off to you VVS. You are our Hero. I am not sure how the Deccan chargers would fare after losing a legend like you.

IPL saga - Player auctions

IPL saga continues and intrigues. The present edition is already promising to be a bollywood potboiler. There was the sorry spectacle of international players being auctioned as if they are prime cattle being played out right in front of live national television. The most surprising part of the auction was that it was telecast live. Most people found it very normal that cricket players were being auctioned and except for a lone Indian who filed a PIL in the court, for the rest of us it was business as usual.  This auction was a spectacle that goes well with our evening cuppa.

At a personal level I found the auction to be in extreme bad taste. To call out a player’s name and then say that he has no takers is in extremely bad state to say the least. My heart was in my heart when Sourav Ganguly’s name was being thrown around like a bad apple that no one wanted. This is no way to treat one of the most famous Indian cricket players. All the franchisees should have seen to it that Sourav was not treated in such a cavalier fashion.

It was pathetic to see Sourav and Mohamed Kaif come back in reckoning for the second time. Luckily to my great relief Mohd Kaif found a buyer but not Sourav. At least BCCI should explain why auctions have been held in this very slipshod fashion.

The next twist in the tail was Pune showing interest in Sourav but the other franchisees objecting to Sourav and that effectively ended the IPL career of one of India’s brightest cricketer.

The IPL smacks of double standards. Pakistani players are not considered at all. IPL is neither a totally talent driven league like English Premier League (EPL) or is it a totally Indian domestic league like the Ranji trophy. What this means is that foreign players are needed but only 5 or 6 of them. Because there is a restriction that only 4 foreign players can play it means that you need to have 7 Indian players for every match.

This has meant that very talented foreign players have not got a buyer and at the same time the capped Indian players have got exceedingly high auction prices. These prices are way above the prices that are commanded by the foreign players.

The uncapped Indian player’s prices are pegged at Rs 40 lakhs, 30 lakhs and 20 lakhs. This means that there is lot of underhand dealings for the uncapped Indian players. What I fail to understand is why BCCI should go though his rigmarole. Why can’t they follow accepted practices and transparent way of doing business? Is that is really too much to ask from the world’s richest cricket board?

Marketing controversy - the IPL fiasco

The IPL controversy has hit us hard. It is grabbing the media attention. Indians throughout the world are appalled at the negative publicity the brand IPL is facing. So what is wrong with IPL?

let's first understand IPL. Indian Premier League (Indian Paisa League as its detractors are fond of calling it) is the brainchild of the erstwhile chairman of IPL Mr. Lalit Modi. But the idea of a Franchise driven TWENTY TWENTY cricket tournament was mooted by another equally brilliant marketer Subash Chandra. Christened ICL (Indian Cricket League) ICL was a great idea but ran into trouble with the BCCI. BCCI refused to grant official league status to ICL. This effectively spelled doom to the budding league.

But like all marketing innovations it as not the inventor who benefitted but the innovative Modi. Modi served up a delightful fare of cricket, cheer girls, bollywood, glamour, film stars, parties and an intoxicating fare of cricket all in the space of three hours. It was a marketer’s delight. Cricket is a very advertiser friendly game (in which other game can you get so much time for inaction where the watcher and be bombarded with so many commercials?).

Before the entry of IPL only thing that was going against cricket was the total time it was consuming. Test cricket takes 5 days, ODIs take one day. Twenty Twenty changed it all. The action only took three hours. Three hours as much time as one takes in watching a movie!.

Within three years IPL emerged as the fourth biggest sports brand in the world. It was valued at over 4.5 billion US dollars. Indians were salivating at the prospect of having the world’s hottest and richest sports brand but tragedy struck the brand.

The sleaze the shady underhand dealings, fixed franchisee bidding, online betting and match fixing came tumbling out of the closets. They have hurt IPL as a brand and have taken a heavy toll on its brand reliability. The resultant fall led to the resigning of Shashi Taroor and the suspension of its charismatic chairman Lalit Modi.

It is undeniable that there are lots of things wrong about IPL but nothing wrong about the brand IPL itself. Saying that brand IPL is sullied and asking for nationalization of IPL is like throwing the baby out along with the dirty bath water.

Suitable corrective actions have to taken to restore public confidence in brand IPL. IPL running should be made transparent and it should be run by a professionally appointed CEO. It can be aided by an expert panel already set up (Gavaskar, Ravi Shastri and Tiger Patuadi). The franchises should also be transparent about their dealings and functioning.

IPL should be made a part of Future Tours programme of the ICC and a window should be provided for IPL. Except players and their coaches no one else should be allowed into the dugout. All types of communication with outside world should be banned for the players when the match is on. All online betting and match fixing allegations should be investigated and if found to be true the operators should be severely penalized and thrown out.

Let us all work together and try to preserve IPL the world class brand that India has created. It is so hugely popular that 58 brands have developed and launched their new campaigns during the 3rd edition of IPL. So popular that players like Gilchrist, Symonds, Mathew Hayden have cut short their international careers to be a part of the IPL Jamboree. Long life IPL.