IPL Franchises Wish To Play Friendly Matches Outside India - Report

In a historic move, the IPL franchises wish to play friendly games with local teams in overseas. If the reports are to be believed, the franchises are looking to improve their fan base away from India and want to increase their popularity.

All the franchises have got a fan base not only in India but also in other parts of the world. In order to establish, even more, the franchises are looking to play friendly matches with the local teams of various countries. The profits earned by the franchise will be shared with the Indian Cricket Board.

It is set to be discussed at the IPL Governing Council meeting at the BCCI HQ in Mumbai on Tuesday.  Mumbai Indians, Kolkata Knight Riders and Sunrisers Hyderabad have already given green signal to the latest initiative while Delhi Capitals also happy to be part of the event.

IPL Franchises would head to US:

Speaking to IANS, sources in the know of developments said that MI had, in fact, proposed the idea of playing friendlies to the Committee of Administrators (CoA) but that had been turned down and the fact that discussing IPL friendlies is listed in the agenda of Tuesday’s meeting is a very positive sign.

“Mumbai Indians’ idea was to promote brand IPL and the game in the US and also to develop a new market for the game. The team would have headed to the US and also play a few games with local teams so as to attract cricket lovers in the region and get them up close and personal with their favourite stars.

“In fact, MI was also keen to share any revenue earned in the process. The IPL clause says that if you as a franchise play outside of the tournament, any revenue earned is to be shared. MI had no problem with that as the idea was to take the game to more homes and increase the fan base,” the source said.

“MI even asked the CoA to provide the window as per their suitability. Playing local matches would popularise the sport as we all know that cricket is not followed much there and also, there are many Indians there and the franchise wanted to go and experiment and see how they can give back to the game.”

We are happy with local players –

However, the availability of International stars is tough for these matches but the franchise is happy to play with the domestic cricketers. IPL franchises believe that there are a lot of Indian fans staying away from the country wish to connect to the cities back home.

“There were questions on the availability of the national team players and we said that we don’t want them. We do realise that releasing them isn’t an option because of the tight schedule and the workload on them. But we aren’t looking at them. We are happy to have the local domestic players,” source quoted as per Hindustan Times.

Well, it would be interesting to see whether the new initiative gets the green signal from the board or not. Everything will depend on the decision of the new IPL Chairman Brijesh Patel, who will take charge on Tuesday.