IPL team owners enraged after BCCI cuts ties with IMG

High-profile owners of team franchises in the Indian Premier League have reacted furiously to the Indian cricket board’s decision to snap ties with event management company IMG, reports said on Monday.

The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) on Saturday terminated its contract with the International Management Group, which helped it launch the lucrative Twenty20 league in 2008.

Business tycoon Mukesh Ambani and Bollywood superstar Shahrukh Khan, both owners of IPL franchisees, have shot off angry letters to the BCCI.

“I am personally shocked at the unilateral decision of doing away with the services of IMG,” the Times of India quoted Ambani, who owns the Mumbai Indians team, as saying in his letter.

“It is also worrying to me that such a significant decision in relation to IPL has been taken without even so much as consulting the franchises.

“I strongly believe that this decision, if taken forward, will destroy substantial value for all the stakeholders, especially the franchises and dilute the success of IPL in the coming years.”

Kolkata Knight Riders owner Khan said IMG had been “an integral part of the tournament management and its success so far” and questioned the logic of the board in ending the deal.

The BCCI had entered into a preliminary agreement with IMG in 2008 to promote and manage IPL’s affairs. IMG was to be paid 10 per cent of the tournament’s gross revenue as commission.

But the board felt the amount was “disproportionate to services rendered”.

Let BCCI decide on Shoaib’s case: Shah Rukh Khan

Kolkata Knight Riders team owner and Bollywood star Shah Rukh Khan said he wants the Pakistan pace spearhead Shoaib Akhtar to play in Indian Premier League (IPL). He reiterated his desire for Shoaib’s presence in his team in a press conference at his residence.

Shah Rukh also said that it’s now up to BCCI to take a decision whether they want the Paksitani bolwer to play in cash-rich Indian Premier League or not.

Controversial fast bowler Shoaib Akhtar’s chances of playing in the lucrative Indian Premier League seemed to be receding with the tribunal to hear his appeal against five-year ban not likely to decide on the matter soon.

Given the busy schedule of the chairman of the appellate tribunal Aftab Farrukh, retired judge of Lahore High Court and now a practicing barrister, it is unlikely that the case will be decided in a hurry.

The IPL starts on April 18 and organisers have said Akhtar, who was to play for Kolkata Knight Riders, would not be eligible to play in the Twenty20 tourney until the Pakistan board removes the ban imposed on him on disciplinary grounds.

“I don’t think we are going to have a situation where the appellate tribunal will reach a decision after one or two sittings and given the busy schedules of the chairman and Salman Taseer the hearings could drag on beyond a month,” a PCB official told.

The tribunal, which had former Test player Haseeb Ahsan and former federal minister Salman Taseer as other members, was set up last week and has a minimum of seven and maximum of 30 days to reach a decision on Akhtar’s appeal.

Akhtar was handed the five-year ban for breach of the players Code of Conduct, having publicly criticised various board policies after he was overlooked for a central contract in January.

Meanwhile, PCB chairman Nasim Ashraf, Disciplinary Committee chairman Muneer Hafeez and Akhtar will appear before the Senate Standing Committee on Sports and Culture on April 14 for a hearing called to look into cricket matters and the events leading up to the ban imposed on Akhtar.

IPL relaxes media restrictions

The standoff between the Indian Premier League and the media over controversial guidelines to cover the inaugural tournament looks set to ease as the IPL governing body has issued relaxed guidelines for media to cover the Twenty20 extravaganza.

The IPL has toned down some of its earlier restrictions, especially benefiting the print media and their respective websites. However, the websites having no print association would not be able to cover the matches from the ground. The IPL ban on news agencies supplying images to the websites stays. The fresh guidelines have been issued after a meeting with media representatives and IPL governing body members on Tuesday.

The new guidelines, which have been reduced to two pages, allowed website reporters to the venue a day before the match and for post match press conferences only. No online use or publication or syndication of any photograph clicked by accredited photographers is allowed except for the website of the publication.

The media gallery of a website can have up to any six pictures per match beyond whatever else is carried in the newspaper’s various editions.

The rules however warned the photographers for supplying pictures to any third party, including web portals and syndicates.

Earlier, IPL chairman and Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) vice-president Lalit Modi agreed to relax rules to benefit the print media after discussing the matter with the Sports Journalists’ Federation of India (SJFI) and sports editors of mainline dailies on Monday.

Last week, the IPL had announced the media guidelines for accreditation, which a large section of the media houses found unacceptable.

The SJFI, on behalf of sports journalists and photographers, requested the BCCI President Sharad Pawar to resolve the contentious clauses.

The contentious norms arose from IPL’s terms and conditions, in which BCCI attempted to appropriate intellectual property rights on photographs shot by media organizations. IPL had banned websites from the event and demanded that agencies and print media houses upload, at their own cost, the pictures shot by them on IPL’s website for unrestricted use. Media organizations were irked by these guidelines, which amounted to restricting the use of images in any other publication even if it belonged to the same media house.

That BCCI was under some pressure was evident – the link to the media guidelines on the official tournament’s website was deactivated soon after the controversy broke.

BCCI releases details on how it will sell IPL

India’s cricket authorities released terms for owning teams in their proposed Indian Premier League, projecting the franchises as both a profit-making business opportunity as well as platforms for corporate branding. The prospectus, however, doesn’t set any minimum bid price for tenders set to be floated later this month.

 

BCCI vice-president and chairman of Indian Premier League, Lalit Modi Successful bidders will get to keep 80% of revenues in the first two years of operations.

Their share gradually goes down to 50% in year 11. Revenues are expected to be generated through television rights, sponsorships, tickets, food and other sales as well as premium and box seats.

The 75-page document, which comes with interspersed pictures of cricketers, notes that the league’s format of just 20 overs per team is one that is now most preferred by fans of the game. It claims that 76% of Indian cricket fans favour it over one-day matches and five-day Test matches and notes how it will get high television ad rates.

During the recent India-Pakistan cricket series, Test matches shown on channel Neo Sports attracted Rs3 lakh for a 10-second spot while one-day matches got Rs5.51 lakh for a similar slot.

But, a similar spot during the final of the Twenty20 World Cup in South Africa earned broadcaster ESPN Star Sports Rs800,000, the prospectus notes. The league will be “a must have, prime time content for broadcasters” who will have 12,744 10-second ad spots during a typical season, the prospectus said.

Other than suggesting what ad spots might sell for, the prospectus gives little clues on suggested prices for those aspiring to buy teams. “The bid will require each bidder to state the total franchisee fee they are offering for an initial 10-year period,” it says.

In earlier interviews, the league’s chairman and vice-president of the Board of Control for Cricket in India, Lalit Modi, had said the price would be $50 million (Rs198 crore). The league will take “cricket to a whole new level that once upon a time ago seemed like a fool’s dream,” Modi wrote in the prospectus.

“It means we finally revive domestic cricket.” Apart from the franchise fee, a bidder would have to pay player and staff salaries, stadium leases, security, travel and accommodation.

The league will publish an intention to tender (ITT) later this month and the auction of players will follow immediately after the franchises have been awarded. The ITT will name cities and stadium terms with bidders allowed to bid for multiple locations.

The league is scheduled to begin in April at the start of India’s fiscal year when new advertising and marketing budgets kick in. Some major sponsors of cricket had mixed reactions to owning teams.

One top official at Pepsico India Holdings Pvt. Ltd, who didn’t want to be named, said his company wasn’t interested and that “our calendar is full.” A Bharti Airtel Ltd spokesperson said it was “premature” to discuss buying a team. Future Group chairman Kishore Biyani said: “There would be a very strong chance we will participate.”

BCCI okays $400,000 sign-on fee for Warne

Shane Warne will be the Indian Premier League’s most expensive signing, at a cost of US$400,000 for the first season, set to kick off in April 2008. The finance committee of the Board of Control for Cricket in India met in Mumbai on Friday and approved several decisions taken by the IPL’s governing council regarding payment of its players.

The fee quoted for Warne is the signing amount for him to be part of the player pool from which franchises will bid for the rights to employ players within their ranks. With Brian Lara reportedly being paid US$1 million to appear in the Indian Cricket League, and the market heating up over the two rival leagues, Warne and similar big-ticket signings could rope in well in excess of US$1 million, sources revealed.

The second-highest signing-on fee has, not surprisingly, been paid to Glenn McGrath, whose nifty line-and-length bowling see him join up for US$350,000. Stephen Fleming, whose agents flirted with the ICL but in the end held back – to the extent that Fleming was one of those present at the IPL’s launch – also nets US$350,000.

Mohammad Yousuf, who had reportedly signed with the ICL before being lured away by the Pakistan board – which made no effort to stop Inzamam-ul-Haq, Abdul Razzaq or Imran Farhat from joining the unrecognised league – has signed up with the IPL for US$330,000. A surprise entrant in the top five – and at the moment the list does not include current Australian or Indian cricketers – is Shoaib Malik, who is guaranteed US$300,000.

The ICL, which is nearing the end of its inaugural edition, will hand out approximately Rs 18 crore [approx. US$4.5 million] in total prize-money for its 16-day tournament.

The fees have been decided for only 34 of the 49 cricketers signed up by the IPL, sources said, and, of these, only 11 have received [partial] advance payments. The only player to receive payment in full is Yousuf, not surprising given that he was once a dead certainty to join the ICL. It is understood that McGrath is among those who have been given a sizeable advance.

The 29 others who have received contracts:

[All amounts in US$]
Australia Justin Langer 175,000
Sri Lanka Farveez Maharoof: 150,000, Kumar Sangakkara: 250,000, Mahela Jaywardene: 250,000, Muttiah Muralitharan: 250,000, Sanath Jayasuriya: 250,000, Nuwan Zoysa: 100,000, Dilhara Fernando: 150,000, Chaminda Vaas: 175,000, Lasith Malinga: 200,000
Pakistan Mohammad Asif 225,000, Shahid Afridi: 225,000, Shoaib Akhtar: 225,000, Younus Khan: 225,000
West Indies Shivnarine Chanderpaul 175,000
New Zealand Daniel Vettori 225,000, Jacob Oram 200,000, Scott Styris 150,000, Brendon McCullum 175,000
South Africa Loots Bosman 150,000, AB de Villiers 175,000, Albie Morkel 200,000, Graeme Smith 225,000, Herschelle Gibbs 225,000, Shaun Pollock 200,000, Ashwell Prince 150,000, Makhaya Ntini 175,000, Mark Boucher 175,000, Jacques Kallis 200,000.

IPL only with CA consent: Gilchrist

HOBART: Wicketkeeper Adam Gilchrist says Australia’s cricketers are not trying to be “rebels” and will heed the company line when it comes to playing in the Indian Premier League.

The vice-captain said on Sunday that he was one of about a dozen top-level players to receive a letter from Cricket Australia chief executive James Sutherland, warning them against playing in next year’s IPL Twenty20 tournament without Cricket Australia’s consent. Cricket Australia has told 11 of its top players, including captain Ricky Ponting,

Brett Lee and Gilchrist that they would not be granted permission to play in the ICC-sanctioned Indian Premier League’s Twenty20 tournament.

James Sutherland claimed the players signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to play in the tournament in April and May without consulting the Board. “A number of significant issues remain unresolved, particularly regarding Australian players’ participation in the proposed events and the terms of participation,” Sutherland said. Australia’s top players could earn up to $1 million for just a few weeks’ work with the IPL.

This is on top of their Cricket Australia contracts, which are worth a minimum $1,40,000. — Agencies

Gilchrist’s fears about IPL

Melbourne: Cribbing about burnout and then making a beeline to play in the cash-rich Indian Premier League (IPL) would portray cricketers as hypocrites, fears Australia vice- captain Adam Gilchrist.

Gilchrist said though cricketers had always played county cricket to earn extra money in the off-season, complaining about burnout and then making a dash for cash in the Twenty20 might project them in a bad light.

“I do see that, I think that’s definitely something Cricket Australia will feel, and that’s something we as a playing group have to consider,” Gilchrist was quoted as saying by The Age.

“(But) it has been going on for years and years. Players have been going to England in off-seasons and taking opportunities to play and learn the game and earn some good money over in England. But I do understand critics might say that we are trying to get less (cricket), but when something else comes up we want more,” he said.

Neil Maxwell, IPL’s Australian agent, however, argues that IPL’s shorter format would reduce the workload. “Players who have looked to make money in the past have tended to go to England, where they can be playing county cricket for as many as five months,” said Maxwell “This is an alternative to that,” he said.

IPL boss: we won’t lure stars

INDIA’S Twenty20 supremo has guaranteed the cashed-up Indian Premier League will not attempt to lure international players away from their national teams, allaying concerns of a Packer-style split developing within the game.

Lalit Modi’s comments come in response to a strongly-worded letter from Cricket Australia chief executive James Sutherland, addressed to senior Australian players who have signed contracts with the BCCI-backed IPL.

In the letter, published in The Sun-Herald yesterday, Sutherland forbade CA-contracted players from linking with the IPL until “various terms and conditions” were resolved, prompting fears of an exodus of disgruntled cricketers to the lucrative Indian Twenty20 League.

But Modi, head of the IPL and vice-president of the Board of Control for Cricket in India, moved to defuse the controversy yesterday, confirming the IPL was not seeking to undermine foreign boards, or the sanctity of Test and limited-overs cricket.

“The national teams come first,” Modi told the Herald from India last night.

“We will only choose players if they are free from international commitments. There is no conflict. The national teams come first.”

Modi’s sentiments were yesterday echoed by Sutherland, Australian Cricketers’ Association chief Paul Marsh and Australian vice-captain Adam Gilchrist, all of whom insisted players would be available for the IPL only during breaks in the Australian team’s schedule.

The Herald understands the 11 Australian players to have signed short-form Memoranda of Understanding with the IPL – including Gilchrist, Ricky Ponting and Brett Lee – were placed under significant time pressure to do so. With a limited number of contracts on offer, the BCCI offered to pay leading players 25 per cent of their contract value up-front if they signed by a deadline.

But by agreeing to the short-form MOU, the 11 players did not commit their services to a competition that, in its inaugural year, will directly conflict with Australia’s Test tour of Pakistan. In fact, Australia’s core players are unlikely to turn out in the IPL for the next two seasons, due to pre-existing commitments with the Test and one-day teams. That being the case, the players will likely receive only the initial 25 per cent “sign on” portion of the contract.

“The workload and the timing of when the Indian Premier League is on … it might be that Australian players are only able to play one of the next three years,” Sutherland said yesterday. “In terms of choosing to play in the IPL instead of fulfilling their [CA] commitments, it’s just not going to happen. There’s no indication that players are looking to put the IPL ahead of the pride of wearing their Australian colours.”

As it stands, contracted players will be placed in a national draft, and can be chosen by any of India’s eight IPL franchises, who will compete for $US3 million ($3.4 million) in prizemoney and the chance to advance to the Twenty20 Champions’ League, involving provincial sides from Australia, England and South Africa.

IPL contracts are understood to be worth up to $1 million for top players.

“In many ways, it’s like county cricket,” said Marsh, who met players before the Hobart Test to discuss the IPL. “Players are able to play in England during breaks in the CA schedule and only with the board’s approval. It’s not a choice between your country and the IPL, and certainly nothing like World Series Cricket.”

Gilchrist concurred, adding that players would not participate in the IPL without CA’s approval.

“I think it’s pretty dramatic to draw comparisons between the Twenty20 revolution and World Series Cricket all those years ago,” he told AAP. “World Series Cricket was quite dramatic, and there was a lot of bad blood around at that time, from what I’ve learnt, but it’s far from that at the moment.

“No one will play [in the IPL] without consent. We’re not trying to be rebels here. It’s a new opportunity for cricketers and it’s a very exciting one that I know Cricket Australia are endorsing and encouraging.”

The IPL is not without its issues, however. The one-and-a-half page short-form MOU issued by the IPL was described by Marsh as “lacking in a lot of detail,” and the long-form documents have yet to be received.

Other potential areas of conflict could arise in regards to the rights of players in the IPL draft, as well as conflicts between IPL sponsors and those of national boards. The IPL is also competing with the rebel Indian Cricket League, which started last week.

ICL vs IPL: Clash of cricket titans

One of the most hotly debated issues in Indian cricket right now is the advent of the rebel Indian Cricket League and whether it stands a chance against it’s more high-profile and official cousin, the IPL.

The jury is still out on whether the ICL can survive the competition, but as of now the Boses at the Essel owned Zee group are going all out to sell the ICL product.

The Essel Group’s Indian Cricket League or the ICL flaunting its big names — Brian Lara, Chris Cairns, Marvan Atapattu and Inzamam-ul-Haq are in India gearing up for the kick off on Friday the 30th of November.

Lara’s delayed arrival had raised speculation that he may be pulling out.

But the former West Indian captain says he always intended to keep his commitment even though this league is totally unofficial and does not have the backing of the ICC.

“The ICC is trying to encourage new countries like China and America to play cricket. I am disappointed it is not supporting a league where so many international stars are participating,” said Brian Lara.

The main difference between the ICL and the soon to be launched IPL or Indian Premier League is clearly the star power.

The IPL has already signed on 50 of the top current players in the world. But most cricketers believe that there will still be a place for the ICL.

It is a safe haven for recently retired players and those who are on the fringes of domestic cricket in India.

“Cricketers have been brave to defy their national boards in seeking this opportunity to play in the ICL,” said Chris Cairns.

However, the biggest difference between the official IPL and the unofficial ICL is sponsorship.

While the IPL hopes to raise a 1000 crores from TV rights, the Essel group backed ICL still does not have any sponsors. It has only got partners for drinks, uniforms and travel. But maybe that is to be expected for a new venture.

“Essel group has truckloads of money,” said Navjot Sidhu, NDTV’s cricket expert.

So, the ICL is the definite underdog, but they have promised slick coverage, great action and more importantly a platform for players to earn more money.

War of the leagues get uglier

The tussle for supremacy between The Kapil Dev led Indian Cricket League and  the Sharad Pawar led Indian Premier League battle has worsened.

In the latest sequence of events, the Indian Cricket League has launched a scathing attack on the IPL by questioning it’s integrity right from the administrators, players and the officials.

This is after the Indian Premier League upped the ante by urging Brian Lara to leave the rebel Indian Cricket league and join the BCCI-promoted cricket league.

The drama started when BCCI Vice President Rajiv Shukla made IPL’s intent public of poaching Brian Lara.

Shukla said that the IPL will revoke bans on all international stars who are currently contracted with the Indian Cricket league and take them into the official Indian Premier League once they break ties with the ICL. Shukla’s comments days prior to ICL’s first match has clearly spelt the start of the war of the leagues.

However, Ashish Kaul Vice President of the Essel group has launched an equally scathing attack saying he’s not suprised considering the BCCI is known to stoop to low levels.