IPL: REVOLUTION IT BROUGHT TO WORLD CRICKET

The Twenty over cricket which originated in England was devised to make English
County Cricket livelier and attract crowds in the stadium. The English Cricket was going
through a major crisis and the introduction of Twenty-20 was instrumental in bringing
an adrenaline rush of excitement in the game of cricket. But English were left in
astonishment as the new sport they had created in their own backyard was spun into a
form of League Cricket which revolutionised the world cricket in the years to come.

The Indian Premier League (IPL) is the most watched and attended league in the
world. It ranks sixth among sports leagues, and became the first sporting event in
history to be broadcast live on YouTube back in 2010. Total viewership of IPL
stood at a whopping 462 million views in the 12th edition of the league on Star
network channels. Such was the fame of this new tournament that Star Sports
bought the media rights of IPL at a gigantic $2.55 billion. The IPL has also
introduced a host of revolutionary changes in the structure of the game. It initiated
an auction and transfer system of players involving hefty amounts of money,
replacing the traditional region-based teams.
Indian Premier League (IPL) has defined a new set of paradigm to do business in
the Indian landscape. This was bound to happen someday, looking at the craze
for the cricket in this country. IPL is not a yet another cricket extravaganza but
an event where money is spun around with many different angles and huge stakes
are involved in it. IPL has corporatized cricket in a unique way. It has added a
new dimension of marketing and branding the sport in India. IPL is a business
which has big economy of scale. India has seen the success of different businesses
and the organizations or entrepreneurs running them and now it is the turn of IPL.
Overall IPL itself has become a big brand under the leadership of Top
management and it is a matter of interest that how it has been done as compared
to the failure of its rival league ICL. The Value Positioning of IPL is “Fast and
Quick Entertainment” Which has its own pros and cons according to the test and
50-50 Over Cricket Fraternity.
Since IPL has come into the scenario the lesser known players are getting more
and more exposure and hence economically, they are getting better and living
pretty good and luxurious life which is the dream of each and every individual. It
has inspired more parents to allow their kids to take up cricket as career option.
More importantly it has provided the growing middle class a true entertainment
as they don’t get much time to watch those hours long Test matches and even
ODIs.
 It was also brought to light that during IPL season, there was a significant rise in
tourism with large number of international visitors from countries like, United
Kingdom, South Africa and Australia. These are cricket loving nations with large
fan bases. Since IPL cricket matches are played all over India, they bring vast
media coverage. Tier-2 cities are investing more in the city’s infrastructure and
development benefits from IPL’s media exposure, and see a rise in tourism related
activities which can generate greater revenues for the city. Furthermore, while the
IPL has increased the BCCI revenues, it also resulted in greater tax contributions,
which means higher government revenues.
Beyond doubt, in India, Bollywood is often treated as an obsession, and a
synergistic relationship between the industry and the IPL brings with it
acceptance, veneration, credibility, and tangible profits. Realizing the popularity
of IPL galas, top Bollywood stars promote forthcoming movies and songs during
cricket matches. Teams owned by non-Bollywood entrepreneurs have been
cashing in on the mesmeric appeal of Bollywood heartthrobs as brand
ambassadors. The cricket-Bollywood nexus is a neoliberal mechanism to market
entertainment products and celebrities, which produces increased profits by
captivating televised audiences through the appeal of cricket and Bollywood. For
those who cannot afford to attend the star-studded games or do not live in or near
IPL cities, television becomes the vehicle through which a broad spectrum of
fans, particularly the ‘middle class’ with money to spend, experiences the sport.
Bollywood’s involvement in the IPL gala cultivates a huge mass of fans who
develop allegiances with the teams owned by their favourite stars and keeps them
captivated during the event.
The introduction of T-20 cricket and IPL has been arguably the most innovative
and influential development in cricket in the last 40 years. But while IPL witness
around 80,000 crowds in the stadium in a single match, Test Cricket is struggling
to find attendees to fill much smaller grounds and in England, attendances at
County Championship games are dwindling to almost vanishing points. Cricket
is considered as the gentleman’s game. With IPL’s reduced time, it has lost both
its image and also the quality of the game. The good old times of people thronging
stadiums for days to watch test matches for nearly a week is long gone now. Even
the one-day matches are slowly losing sheen, and only world cups and significant
tournaments are having viewership in the television sets and fewer in stadiums.
It could hit the cricket in the long run. In Test Cricket, no batsman gets to score
runs without hard work, and similarly no bowler gets easy wickets; as they might
get in IPL. Lac of 'test' of concentration, fitness, temperament, Cricketing
skills and mostly ignored - 'Cricketing intelligence' in IPL makes it tough for
players to adapt to Test Cricket as it requires all these skills and their application
on field, day after day. If the player has played just one or two domestic Cricket
seasons, he can play IPL. It offers huge amount of money in just 2 to 3 months.
This motivates new generation people to play only T-20 leagues and does not
bring the fire inside them to play Test Cricket which was the driving factor for
some great Indian players like Sunil Gavaskar, Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid,
etc.
Points to be discussed:
1. Cricket previously was played only between country teams. How IPL
shaped the world cricket?
2. How IPL became so popular in India?
3. What are the positive as well as negative impacts of IPL on Indian
Cricket?
4. Discuss how the amalgam of Cricket and Bollywood made IPL into a
kind of festival event across India.
5. Have Priorities of Indian players changed?