Tag: IPL Amid Covid-19

IPL Hits Covid Gloom Out Of Stadium

By S Kannan

Way back, in 2008, when the first Indian Premier League auction took place, noted cricket writer and former Somerset captain Peter Roebuck likened the auction to a huge cattle sale. He was not the only one who thought like that. Even the stiff upper lip Englishmen and cocky Aussies were full of smirk at the inaugural auction.

How times change! Thirteen years on, the same Englishmen and Aussies, traditional rivals on the cricket pitch, clamour to be part of the IPL. They are ready like “cattle” to be picked up for a price and ready to play in killing heat and humidity which the IPL is all about.

Last week, the latest IPL auction held the audience in thrall. A few days after the highs of victory at Chepauk in Chennai where India crushed England by 317 runs in the second Test, the franchise holders were at the same city bidding for players.

The previous IPL season was held in energy-sapping conditions in the UAE, with Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Sharjah being the venues. Playing in the Bio Bubble due to Covid-19 and being restricted so tightly did not deter the cricketers from playing top-flight club cricket.

In less than four months after the last IPL, it is back to the 2021 auction where Rs 145.30 crores were spent on 57 players. Twenty two of these were from abroad, which makes one wonder what depression and recession is all about in the Indian economy.

To be sure, the IPL has shown it is recession proof, year after year. This was a big auction and the way the teams went about spending moolah showed they were ready to loosen the purse strings on golden oldies. Young Turks also commanded a price.

It was a jaw-dropping moment when Chris Morrison, from South Africa, 33, was grabbed by Rajasthan Royals for Rs 16.25 crores. Behind him in the Big IPL Bazaar was Kyle Jamieson of New Zealand who was picked up by Royal Challengers Bangalore for Rs 15 crores.

For those who felt the IPL was only about picking players who are in good form or have a proven track record, Aussie Glen Maxwell, a flop show in the last edition, commanded a price of Rs 14.25 crores and went to RCB. The Virat Kohli led side is yet to win an IPL title.

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Kings XI Punjab, now rechristened as Punjab Kings, bought Jhye Richardson, age 24, at Rs 14 crores, which showed the teams which have not done as well as Mumbai Indians or Chennai Super Kings still play huge stakes in the IPL.

Over the years, purists in cricket, now a dwindling breed, have started accepting the IPL. They will swear the slam-bang, whiz-thud brand of cricket is not to their liking but none minds the huge sixes, players fielding like men ready to give up their lives to catch the ball and bowlers ready for delivering with laser-precision.

At this stage, with Corona virus cases again rising in a few states in India, one is not sure how the BCCI and the IPL head honchos will hold the event this summer. To think of a home-and-away playing format in the Bio Bubble will be impossible. However, when it comes to planning for the IPL, it has always been meticulous and maybe just a few cities are used. Mumbai has four cricket stadia but the Corona cases may be an impeding factor, as of now.

The good thing about the IPL is it has provided a platform for many careers to be built as has been the case with players like T Natarajan, Washington Sundar, and K Gowtham to name a few. Of course, someone like Mohd Azharuddin is complaining Sunrisers Hyderabad hardly has any player from the city.

He has made a pertinent point but the IPL is beyond loyalty for a city or own state. It is a cut-throat and high stakes business model where finding the best players to be part of the franchise matters. In a way, the IPL is like football’s EPL model and other club franchises in Europe. What matters to the owners is having the best players.

Look at Chennai Super Kings. They are still going with MS Dhoni, age 39 and veteran Suresh Raina even as they have picked a few good players like Gowtham (Rs 9.25 crores), Moeen Ali (Rs 7 crores) and durable Test batsman Cheteshwar Pujara at Rs 50 lakhs. Social media is divided over the price for Pujara. But for those who know his real value in the Test format, he is priceless and he is quite happy he is in the IPL mix after a long hiatus.

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Punjab Kings had a purse of Rs 53.2 crores at their disposal and spent Rs 34.4 crores. Royal Challengers Bangalore could spend a maximum of Rs 35.4 crores and splurged Rs 35.05 crores. Kolkata Knight Riders had a low budget of Rs 10.75 crores at their disposal and spent Rs 7.55 crores.

Rajasthan Royals had Rs 37.85 crores at their disposal and spent Rs 24.2 crores. Delhi Capitals were not able to spend much as they had Rs 13.4 crores in their kitty of which they spent Rs 11.25 crores. Mumbai Indians had Rs 15.34 crores to buy and used Rs 11.7 crores. And Sunrisers Hyderabad were conservative when they spent Rs 3.8 crores of the Rs 10.75 crores available.

The reason for varying sums at the disposal of various franchises is how much they have spent in the past as there is an overall budget cap. For some teams, fancy names may matter but overall the owners have become smarter and pick players who can deliver in the high pressure IPL.

The return of Vivo as IPL sponsor is very interesting. Last time when the IPL was held in 2020, emotions were high as “Chinese virus” had led to blacklisting and boycott of anything to do with our neighbouring country. Today, one hears of big incidents between India and China on the border but people have forgotten about the Chinese virus!

For the BCCI, having IPL is a win-win situation as they rake in big bucks, officials details of which have not been made public. That the IPL is business plus glamour was never in doubt. Maybe, we can see cheerleaders again. Maybe, we can see fans inside the arena again.

All in all, the IPL definitely lifts the gloom. It is an ecosystem in itself which supports many. Like it or lump it, the IPL has shown, even in difficult times, it remains a hot brand. So, why should cricketers and those in the business of IPL be left behind?

Money Talks: IPL Organisers Are Shameless

By S Kannan

In forty days, the Indian Premier League, cricket’s most hyped club tournament, will be roaring in the United Arab Emirates. Given the situation now in India, with COVID-19 surge, it is impossible to think of hosting any sporting event. Forget a tournament, even in the local area of your city, playing sport is still considered risky.

Ideally, in such a situation, where sporting action is near zero and even elite athletes preparing for the postponed Tokyo Olympics are struggling to get going, there is no place for cricket. Even Australia has postponed the ICC World T20, another blockbuster cricketing event.

Sadly, the mandarins who “head” cricket administration in India (read BCCI) by default, Sourav Ganguly and Jay Shah, have ensured the IPL takes place. Nobody minds watching the IPL, which is more commerce and less cricket. But the timing of the event is baffling and why are the organisers so desperate for a club event that it is being moved offshore to a country like UAE.

Ideally, if at all cricket has to resume in India, it has to be first at the club level, then national level. If things get better and the COVID-19 situation improves, one can think of international cricket, maybe in 2021. Ignoring the ground realities, the government has given the permission for the event to be staged abroad. There are many reasons why this permission should not have been given.

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For those familiar with off-shore cricket having been played in the UAE in the late 1980s and 1990s, images of Sharjah should be fresh in memory. The anti-India slogans, a mix of glitz and glamour, mafia dons appearing on stands, Bollywood starlets in the background, cannot be erased. Cricket in Sharjah then became synonymous with players from India and Pakistan being paid huge “benefit funds”. One is not sure how this money was generated but the benefactors did not mind it. However, once it became clear that cricket in the Gulf was not clean, viewers started avoiding it.

A similar heady mix was recreated in 2008 as IPL, bringing together cricket mania and Bollywood glamour. Money flowed in. Before the lockdown, brand values of top IPL teams as of March 2020, stand as follows: Mumbai Indians – ₹809 crores; Chennai Super Kings – ₹732 crores; Kolkata Knight Riders – ₹629 crores and; Royal Challengers Bangalore – ₹595 crores.

Clearly, the stakes are high, despite the fact the BCCI has lost its title sponsor (Vivo) for this season. The brand value of the Vivo sponsorship deal was estimated at ₹450 crores. As Vivo has now pulled out of this year’s IPL deal, owing to an anti-China sentiment post-Galwan valley clashes on LAC, the BCCI is hoping they can get a new title sponsors for even half that sum. Strangely, Patnajali is being touted as a front-runner for the slot.

For the sake of these big bucks, COVID-19 protocols are being compromised. Everyone knows that creating a bio bubble is not easy. That has been done in England and Europe for hosting football tournaments and cricket as well. It succeeded to some extent but there is still risk in a sport like cricket (IPL).

You can ban the fans from stadia in UAE and host the IPL just so that the broadcaster shows tamasha cricket which will be played in high temperatures and extreme humidity. It will be killing for the players. The players have not played any matches and their bodies, despite all training, will be still fragile. To punish the player’s body for holding IPL, a glorified club event, is shocking.

To put it bluntly, the BCCI and IPL governing council are shameless. For them, commerce is more important than health and safety. One galling fact is that even former greats of the sport like Sunil Gavaskar and even Rahul Dravid are batting for the event.

Even though the cases of COVID-19 have shown a decline, one cannot gloss over the fact that UAE had 62,525 positive cases. The recovery was 56,568 and death toll 357. As of now, it is the only country near India which has allowed tourists to fly in. The passenger only needs to have a negative COVId-19 test report 96 hours before boarding the flight.

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Cricket fans know the IPL has a huge sprinkling of foreign players, where Aussies, Englishmen, West Indians and Sri Lankan players compete. Australia has not opened its international borders and to imagine they will allow players to fly out for the IPL is bizarre. Yet, for the dreamers, the IPL will be on!

Another important fact which cannot be glossed over is how IPL cricket in the UAE is likely to generate huge volumes of betting. Even though sports betting is illegal in the UAE, anyone with a faint idea of how hyped cricket events operate, knows betting takes place in a very clandestine atmosphere. There have been instances of the IPL (2010) in India, getting into controversy because of betting, match fixing and spot fixing.

Is betting being given permission unofficially or are there other compulsions that cricket in the slam bang T20 format has to be played at any cost. The way things are, controlling betting even in domestic Indian football is impossible, as was the case recently in Goa.

Even when the IPL is played in India, there is concern over dubious men being seen near the dressing rooms. Players are under scrutiny and also who they talk to on the phone. People have still not forgotten the old incidents involving players like S Sreesanth and how Chennai Super Kings name was tarnished.

As far as international cricket is concerned, the world body (ICC) has mechanisms to check any shady activity. However, given the fact that the IPL is a glorified club event, there are no institutional checks over what goes behind the stadium. If you think this is for the benefit of players, you are mistaken. They are mere pawns who play to earn pay cheques while the shady characters will sweep big money.

That is IPL for you, where the common man claps and cheers while the dark underbelly operates without batting an eyelid. Raise your voice to stop this farce, at least for one year, when Corona virus has crippled millions.

(The writer is a senior sports journalist. The views and opinion expressed in the article belong solely to the author)