May 26 2009
IPL and money!
It’s only in its second season yet, but the term IPL and money have almost become synonymous. It’s no doubt that the 20-20 cricket format has been evolved for wholesome entertainment-with all the music, cheerleaders and sixes, and anything which entertains has huge money attached to it; especially when its cricket. Needless to say IPL has made all the parties attached to it-the players, team owners, BCCI and sponsors; all happy.
Well a little bit about the Indian premier league’s origin- so it’s only in its second season, it was launched by the BCCI in the year 2008. The format of the IPL is much on the lines of English premier league (remember all the flashy names like Knight Riders and Deccan chargers!), and the much controversial cheerleaders are also taken from it. The IPL is basically based on the franchise system where the highest bidder gets to own the team. Also this encourages a lot of betting. That is the reason that IPL has huge stakes involved in it. In fact it is not just a sport now, it’s more of a business and the businesspersons involved are A class celebs. Be it SRK, Preity Zinta or Ambani, all of them are big time celebrities. They all have huge stakes in their own teams in IPL, amounting to some hundred crores of rupees! And here is the jaw dropping figure- the total base price for auction in IPL was whopping $400 million! Quite a sum I would call it.
Dhoni was the most expensive player in the first season bought by the Chennai super Kings team and now in season two Andrew Flintoff has beaten Dhoni for the most expensive player title. Basically there much more than meets the eye at the IPL. It has graduated from being a sport to being a form of entertainment and currently the IPL is Post Graduating from being entertainment to a big money making industry.









