Rights bonanza promises to enrich India’s domestic game

MUMBAI: It wasn’t without reason that when cricket ground to a halt during the pandemic, every other cricket board and the International Cricket Council made way for IPL. The T20 World Cup was pushed back by a year and IPL relocated to the UAE. The 2020 IPL edition enjoyed maximum overseas player availability with players looking at Ipl—cricket’s most lucrative tournament—to bolster their annual earnings. Even the national retainers of the richest cricket boards, including that of India, don’t match the IPL salaries.

With IPL’S media rights valuation—₹48,390 crore—having trebled from the last five-year cycle, expect player salaries also to be revised. South Africa Test skipper Dean Elgar’s pronouncement before IPL 2022 asking his players to choose country over club may be the last such appeal. If there was any doubt, it no longer exists—the best T20 players in the world will have IPL as No 1 in their list of priorities.

It is Indian cricket that stands to benefit the most from the league’s riches. It will trickle down to everyone from the players, IPL franchises and 38 state associations, and one would hope ultimately to domestic cricket.

The players first. Their salaries will not go up three times as other stakeholders’ share automatically would. That’s because the players are paid by the franchises and not BCCI. “A structured increase has already been agreed, which is ₹5 crore per year, which again will maintain the IPL as the highest paid (cricket) league in the world and

in an interview to PTI will keep players extremely well paid in this tournament,” Rajasthan Royals lead owner Manoj Badale recently said.

BCCI though has agreed to revise player salaries by raising the salary cap at player auctions from time to time, once the franchises begin to reap the fruits of media rights revisions. The players would be keenly awaiting such a move from the Indian board. The salary cap which was ₹25 crore per team back in 2008 has gone up to ₹90 crore. In a 10-team IPL, assuming each squad has 24 players, the average player salary is ₹3.75 crore. To keep up with what was a healthy share, 22% of media rights value earmarked for player salaries, the pay would need to rise further.

The franchises and state associations stand to benefit proportionately, based on the current revenue sharing formula. From the media rights income, 50% is shared among the 10 franchises and the other half goes to BCCI. If a franchise was getting ₹200 crore as its share as per the last rights valuations, it would now go up to over ₹480 crore (their annual expenditure is around ₹150 crore).

The BCCI passes on 70% of its media rights share to its state units. As per the last revision, it was around ₹30 crore per association. That would now triple, to a whopping ₹90 crore. The hosting associations—there are 10 now—also get ₹1 crore per match—50% each from BCCI and franchises as staging fees. This could also be further revised for stadium upkeep.

The domestic cricketers, whose match fees were recently revised but only on a graded basis, would be looking for a bigger slice from the IPL bonanza. “The BCCI will utilise the revenue generated from IPL to strengthen our domestic cricket structure starting from grassroots, to boost infrastructure and spruce up facilities across India and enrich the overall cricket-watching experience,” BCCI secretary Jay Shah said. With the general state of fan experience inside stadiums still quite poor, it will be an area that will be watched.