 "Curtains on Champions League T20")
A day after a Supreme Court-appointed committee, headed by former chief justice R M Lodha, banned Indian Premier League franchises Chennai Super Kings and Rajasthan Royals, the governing council of the Champions League Twenty20 (CLT20) on Wednesday announced the annual T20 tournament would be discontinued. In a media advisory, the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) said the tournament would be scrapped with immediate effect, meaning the 2015 edition would not take place.
The governing council of CLT20, comprising representatives of BCCI, Cricket South Africa (CSA) and Cricket Australia (CA) made the decision unanimously, the statement added.
Anurag Thakur, honorary secretary of BCCI, said: "This has been a difficult decision as CLT20 provided added context to a number of domestic Twenty20 competitions around the world, such as IPL in India, Big Bash League in Australia and South Africa's Ram Slam T20."
Further details on winding down the league, including settling with the three nations that had invested time and effort in the competition, will be completed soon.
One of the biggest commercial investments in the league had come from STAR India. The Uday Shankar-led television network held the broadcast rights for the tournament from 2008 to 2017.
According to media reports, the network, which operates eight sports channels (four standard-definition and four high-definition ones) in India, had bought the rights for Rs 5,524 crore, which translates into roughly Rs 550 crore a year.
However, unlike other properties like the ICC Cricket World Cup, the BCCI tournaments (international matches organised by BCCI), England board matches or Australia board ones, CLT20 failed to rake in the moolah. For example, according to sources, STAR India last year managed to make between Rs 325 crore and Rs 350 crore in advertising revenue during the 18-day tournament. And that was in a year when the tournament was held in India, so the on-ground attendance and timings were not much of an issue.
A planner in the know says, "Last year, the ad rate for 10-second spots in the tournament were around Rs 1.25 lakh (average for the tournament). This means the channel made Rs 325 to Rs 350 crore for the 2015 edition of the tournament in ad revenues. That does not even cover the telecast rights fee it pays the tournament organisers."
Vipin Nair, joint MD and co-founder of Baseline Ventures, a sports marketing company, adds: "It was a great concept to have the best of the T20 teams from around the world participating in an event. So, from an advertiser point of view, it would have made a lot of sense. That's why we had an Airtel as the Title sponsor for the first few editions. However, that association didn't last long as CLT20 turned out to be a poor cousin of IPL."
Unlike the Pepsi IPL, CLT20 consisted of domestic franchises from other countries which Indian viewers were not familiar with. Just like IPL in India has players from the domestic leagues, these tournaments from other country have players who are yet to play for their respective national teams. Therefore, they are unknown faces and do not find many takers in the audience. The main advertising revenue would come from the matches involving at least one of the four IPL teams qualifying for the tournament in the year.
Nair agrees: "While IPL has/had eight teams, CLT20 had only three IPL teams in the beginning, and four teams later. So, the Indian viewers were less interested in watching the top local teams of Australia playing against the top local teams of South Africa. It is the same with non-India match in the World Cup event, too. Also, the whole aura around IPL - right from day 1 - has been a family entertainment experience across cities in India. Somehow, the same look and feel of the event could not be replicated for the Champions League. Even for advertisers, they go by ratings and popularity and somehow the ratings plus popularity for the Champions League were just not there when compared to IPL."
STAR India was unavailable for comment on the matter, but sources close to the broadcaster assured that the cancellation of the tournament would come as a relief to the company. STAR India's investment in cricket runs into thousands of crores of rupees a year, since it has telecast rights to multiple board and ICC tournaments. On average, the network spends close to Rs 2,500 crore a year on telecast rights only (excluding the now-scrapped CLT20).
STAR'S STAKE
The governing council of CLT20, comprising representatives of BCCI, Cricket South Africa (CSA) and Cricket Australia (CA) made the decision unanimously, the statement added.
Anurag Thakur, honorary secretary of BCCI, said: "This has been a difficult decision as CLT20 provided added context to a number of domestic Twenty20 competitions around the world, such as IPL in India, Big Bash League in Australia and South Africa's Ram Slam T20."
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"Unfortunately, off the field, CLT20 wasn't sustaining as much interest among fans as we had hoped. This decision was made after consultation with all our commercial partners and meeting the contractual obligations of all parties involved," he added.
Further details on winding down the league, including settling with the three nations that had invested time and effort in the competition, will be completed soon.
One of the biggest commercial investments in the league had come from STAR India. The Uday Shankar-led television network held the broadcast rights for the tournament from 2008 to 2017.
According to media reports, the network, which operates eight sports channels (four standard-definition and four high-definition ones) in India, had bought the rights for Rs 5,524 crore, which translates into roughly Rs 550 crore a year.
However, unlike other properties like the ICC Cricket World Cup, the BCCI tournaments (international matches organised by BCCI), England board matches or Australia board ones, CLT20 failed to rake in the moolah. For example, according to sources, STAR India last year managed to make between Rs 325 crore and Rs 350 crore in advertising revenue during the 18-day tournament. And that was in a year when the tournament was held in India, so the on-ground attendance and timings were not much of an issue.
A planner in the know says, "Last year, the ad rate for 10-second spots in the tournament were around Rs 1.25 lakh (average for the tournament). This means the channel made Rs 325 to Rs 350 crore for the 2015 edition of the tournament in ad revenues. That does not even cover the telecast rights fee it pays the tournament organisers."
Vipin Nair, joint MD and co-founder of Baseline Ventures, a sports marketing company, adds: "It was a great concept to have the best of the T20 teams from around the world participating in an event. So, from an advertiser point of view, it would have made a lot of sense. That's why we had an Airtel as the Title sponsor for the first few editions. However, that association didn't last long as CLT20 turned out to be a poor cousin of IPL."
Unlike the Pepsi IPL, CLT20 consisted of domestic franchises from other countries which Indian viewers were not familiar with. Just like IPL in India has players from the domestic leagues, these tournaments from other country have players who are yet to play for their respective national teams. Therefore, they are unknown faces and do not find many takers in the audience. The main advertising revenue would come from the matches involving at least one of the four IPL teams qualifying for the tournament in the year.
Nair agrees: "While IPL has/had eight teams, CLT20 had only three IPL teams in the beginning, and four teams later. So, the Indian viewers were less interested in watching the top local teams of Australia playing against the top local teams of South Africa. It is the same with non-India match in the World Cup event, too. Also, the whole aura around IPL - right from day 1 - has been a family entertainment experience across cities in India. Somehow, the same look and feel of the event could not be replicated for the Champions League. Even for advertisers, they go by ratings and popularity and somehow the ratings plus popularity for the Champions League were just not there when compared to IPL."
STAR India was unavailable for comment on the matter, but sources close to the broadcaster assured that the cancellation of the tournament would come as a relief to the company. STAR India's investment in cricket runs into thousands of crores of rupees a year, since it has telecast rights to multiple board and ICC tournaments. On average, the network spends close to Rs 2,500 crore a year on telecast rights only (excluding the now-scrapped CLT20).
STAR'S STAKE
- Rs 4,603 crore: Exclusive media rights from BCCI for 2012-18
- Rs 11,400 crore (approx): ICC broadcast rights for 2015-2022
- Rs 203 crore: Team India sponsorship for 2014-17