Why Sahara should not pay Rs 3.

34 cr for every India match Ashish Magotra Feb 7, 2012 #BCCI-Sahara row #Cricket #HowThisWorks #Sports #Team India EmailShare inShare12 Comments Over the last few days, weve heard Sahara Parivar chief Subrata Roy go on and on about the emotional connect he has with Team India. But despite that connect, he has also reiterated time and again that while the sponsorship deal with Team India is history, he remains willing to reconsider his stand on the Pune Warriors for the sake of the players. Hence, all the talk about a patch-up being on the cards and the BCCI having extended the olive branch to the Sahara Parivar. But really the question we should be asking is will the Sahara Group reconcile with the Board of Control for Cricket in India. Rather it is should they?

The brand value of the Indian team simply isnt the same anymore. So does Sahara want to pay Rs 3.34 crores for every match Team India plays? Or can they build a better brand through an IPL team? Punit Paranjpe/AFP Roy may look as if he is taking the emotional angle but he is actually a very shrewd businessman. And no businessman will want to put in tons of money into a venture and not get enough pay back for it. A look at the BCCIs 2011 annual report, which is available on the official website, reveals rather startling figures.

BCCI (Team India, Ranji, etc) had a gross income of Rs 805.04 crores last year. But their total expenditure during the same period was Rs 782.37 crores. So they basically recorded a surplus of just Rs 22.67 crores. In stark comparison, IPL had a gross income of Rs 973.38 crores and a total expenditure of Rs 854.62 crores a surplus of Rs 118.76 crores. The IPL offshoot, the Champions League T20 a meaningless tournament in the eyes of many had a gross income of Rs 247.97 crores. The total expenditure for this multi-nation event was Rs 199.68. A surplus of Rs 48.29 crores resulted from the event. So out of a combined total of Rs 189.72 crores the BCCI (Team India, Ranji, etc) contributed just Rs 22.67 crores. The rest of it Rs 167.05 crores came through the T20 route. Also note, in the image directly below, how the projected surplus for the BCCI actually fell while for IPL and CLT20 it rose.

The BCCI's expected and actual surplus numbers for 2011. So when Roy speaks about how easily another big company can step in to sponsor the Indian team while remaining steadfast on the pullout himself he is in essence saying that it isnt worth his while anymore. BCCI could directly take a hit of over Rs 2,200 crore Rs 1,700 crore as franchisee fee and Rs 534 crore as team India sponsorship fee. The revenues for the IPL could fall too. In 2010, BCCI made Rs 323 crore from the franchisee rights fee of Sahara Pune Warriors and Kochi Tuskers. Thats a direct loss and the number of matches would be reduced to 59 from 76 as planned. No matter which way you look at it, the BCCI is going to lose money a lot of it. But all BCCI president N Srinivasan did was speak about a difference of perception. The brand value of the Indian team simply isnt the same anymore. So does Sahara want to pay Rs 3.34 crores for every match Team India plays? Or can they build a better brand through an IPL team? The answer is crystal clear. And that is why Roy is still open about coming back to the IPL. He can, if he gets back into IPL, push the brand in whichever way he wants. He can have the team turn up at Saharas big projects, have them endorse products and have a bigger say in the running of the team. With Team India, he was a spectator.

So why would he want to sponsor Team India and not an IPL team? Were Sahara getting the kind of value they wanted out of this deal? Would any other sponsor want to pay as much? The IPL-4 got a brand new trophy with the Sanskrit words Yatra Pratibha Avsara Prapnotihi inscribed on it, which translate to Where talent meets opportunity. The opportunity now sadly seems lost. The IPL-5 trophy may get a brand new inscription too. It would roughly translate to Theres no greater enemy than pride. And strangely enough, it would seem rather apt.

The BCCI annual report.