Observers describe it as long overdue. Why wouldn?t they? The emergence of cricket leagues in the country has made the game very exciting, of late. It?s not that it wasn?t interesting in the past. In a country that has only two national pastimes?Bollywood and cricket?there is no denying the popularity of the game. It?s a religion and a passion. But increasingly, cricket is becoming a commodity too, tradable like football in Europe or basketball and golf in the US.
That?s correct. The game of cricket is getting shorter and the temptation of packing in more is getting bigger, which means that the ability to monetise the game is becoming even larger by the day. As Alyque Padamsee, legendary head of ad agency Lintas (which is now Lowe) and currently chairman of the London Institute of Corporate Training, says, ?The only way any sport, not only cricket, can be viable is through the league system, which, during the peak season, has matches played every week.? After one-day cricket, devised specifically for a televi- sion-viewing audience by Kerry Packer of Australia in 1977, this is the next big leap that cricket will take right here in India. Prahlad Kakar, ad filmmaker and chief executive officer of Genesis Films, who is a keen observer of cricket, says, ?It?s good for the sport. The action is right here in the Indian subcontinent. So, it makes sense if the trend begins from here.?
The seeds of this were sown last year, when Mahendra Singh Dhoni and his band of boys came home with the Twenty20 World Cup. Here was a format waiting to be tapped and groups such as the Subhash Chandra-promoted Essel, which has the media network Zee, are wasting no time in capitalising on it by launching a Twenty20 tournament under the aegis of the Indian Cricket League (ICL).
Even bigger, however, is the idea of owning teams and players, mooted by rival Indian Premier League (IPL), promoted by the Board of Control for Cricket (BCCI). On the lines of the English Premier League (EPL) and the National Basketball Association (NBA), the concept will open up myriad possibilities for engagement and association. This seems exciting for those who have traditionally used cricket as an advertising and marketing medium. ?The possibilities are limitless, if you ask me,? says Jayant Khosla, executive director, Mobility, West, Bharti Airtel. ?There is so much that one can do besides conventional advertising in a scenario like that.? This is just one instance of what an advertiser has to say about the ownership of teams and players. It may be noted that the bid price is fairly steep at $50 million for a team (this is the starting price). Bid for players, for the record, is over and above the bid for teams. But the excitement is still there, given the fact that bidders can resell their team rights or list their teams on the stock exchanges or even trade players for that matter. What this creates, in other words, is a viable ecosystem visible in football, for instance, where clubs such as Arsenal are listed on the bourses while others such as Manchester United have opted to delist after trading on the London Stock Exchange for over a decade.
Says Sandeep Singh Arora, executive vice-president, marketing-cola, PepsiCo India, ?We are excited about the league and are evaluating the opportunity for Brand Pepsi.?
Kishore Biyani, chief executive officer of the Future group, who is also said to be interested in IPL?s proposition, says, ?We are pumping in Rs150 crore over the next three years in cricket. This includes associating with budding cricketers, the game and, of course, cricket stars.?
Pepsi, Airtel and the Future group are just a few companies among many others who are seeing a big opportunity in the ownership of cricket teams and the players. By some estimates, more than 90 prospective bidders including corporate houses and investors have come forward to stake their claim to eight teams, who will participate in the IPL?s Twenty20 tournament in April this year.
Lalit Modi, chairman and commissioner of the IPL and vice-president of the BCCI, however, insists the figure is over 100. ?The response has been good,? he says. ?There is no denying that the business of cricket will hit a new high with this.?
That?s the point. With the Indian subcontinent currently accounting for more than 60% of the cricketing revenues in the world, formats like the one mooted by the IPL are bound to increase the amount by many times over the next few years. Though there is no authentic source to determine the total money riding on cricket at the moment in the country, estimates vary from anywhere between Rs 1,500 crore and Rs 15,000 crore. This will double,
however, with the ownership of teams and players setting in simply because there will be more people pumping money into the sport because it will be a viable business proposition for them. As a media analyst based in Mumbai says, ?From a largely advertiser-funded format, cricket will now take different shapes and sizes. I think this was bound to happen at some stage.? Says Anirban Das Blah, chief executive officer, Globosport, ?The economics of the game will be transformed by this.?
A sense of the various avenues on hand can be gauged by looking at football, for instance, which is one of the best monetised games in the world. Professional clubs such as Manchester United do not depend on revenues coming out of the game alone such as ticket sales, advertising and sponsorships, but have devised an elaborate system that ensures that fans remain loyal to the club.
So the club, in conjunction with financial institutions such as Barclays and AIG provides credit cards, loans, insurance and mortgage besides ensuring that fans get the best travel, food and hospitality deals through tie-ups with various partners. Then there are avenues like online gaming, betting, mobile downloads, merchandise, even an exclusive TV channel, which are all subscription-based services. If that?s not enough, the club has message boards, discussions, events, clothes and accessories as part of its basket of offerings for its followers. All of this is clearly aimed at keeping its flock firmly together, even growing it.
Though piped to the post by archrival Real Madrid as the richest football club in the world, Manchester United?s business model is still compelling enough for many to learn from it. In fact, clubs, which have traditionally depended on ticket sales alone to derive revenues, are now turning to the Manchester model for a few healthy clues.
For cricket to go the football way would certainly take some time, as Jeet Banerjee, managing director, Gameplan Sports, says, ?One would have to wait and watch. Footballers earn a lot of money and the league system there is really big.?
The IPL, however, has taken some tentative steps in the direction by announcing that it would spend close to Rs 140 crore on merchandising in the next three years. ICL, on the other hand, says Satish Menon, its president, sales and sponsorships, is exploring various possibilities, but there is no denying the fact that there would be a rush to capitalise on these ventures going forward. ?I think you need to give the league system in cricket five years to mature,? says Padamsee.
Says an industry observer, ?Cricket is no longer the preserve of the BCCI alone. So the invariable competition to be one-up on content and other matters will be there. The big thing is that cricket enthusiasts will now have choices available to them.? Says Kakar, ?The game undoubtedly will take a quantum leap as a result of this. There will be greater transparency and competition. And, of course, viewers will now have options available to them.?
This need for choice as well as compelling content, for instance, drove ICL to put a liberal dose of entertainment right through its 20-day cricket tournament at Panchkula in Haryana last month. Music, dance, stage shows by Bollywood actors, food, beverages and just about everything was put in place to get crowds to the stadium. Says Menon, ?The ground was running to full capacity during the event even on Mondays and Wednesdays. In fact, we had to close the gates on the opening day of the tournament because we simply could not accommodate any more people.?
The advertiser-response to the event was also there with the ICL roping in some 17-18 of them including six team sponsors and five on-ground sponsors. Despite this, television viewership for the tournament was poor with the television rating points or TVRs hovering between 0.05 and 0.36 during the 20-day series. However, ICL executives seem unfazed by this viewing it as a decent start. ?In the face of widespread criticism, we launched the tournament. That is good enough. We?ll keep working on the property to improve viewership,? says Menon.