New T20 league being planned in England to rival IPL and BPL

The England and the Wales Cricket Board (ECB) are going to make the most radical overhaul in the English County Cricket’s history. As reported by the English daily, The Telegraph, ECB is planning to start a new T20 league to rival the Indian Premier League (IPL) and the Big Bash League (BBL).

As per sources, this tournament is likely to begin in early 2018 and will be played for the time period of four weeks. Nat-West T20 Blast is already a great success and with the launch of this new tournament, England will be the only country with two domestic T20 competitions scheduled in its domestic calendar. Counties are keen on playing their T20 matches on Friday nights as that will help increase in revenue by attracting more audience alongside the proposed competition.

The ECB members will have to work hard to convince the counties to make them agree with the Board regarding the new tournament. They require 12 out of 18 counties to vote in favour for the proposal to go ahead.

"A team of officials at the England & Wales Cricket Board has been working for months on the structure of a proposal for a new Twenty20 tournament featuring new teams with new identities, which if agreed by the counties will then be sold to broadcasters with one live match per week set to be shown on terrestrial television," reported The Telegraph.

As per reports, the new T20 tournament may also include new grounds to its list. It says that there are possibilities of playing games at football stadiums like Wembley and Olympic Stadium, where ticket prices can be cut to attract a large audience and new fans to the game. The report also says that accountant firm Deloitte, is currently evaluating the worth of the tournament and is also conducting a financial review of the state of the current Nat-West Blast T20.

The English Cricket Board will be looking for a single Multinational Company who would be the title sponsor and will follow the Cricket Australia Model. “The ECB will be looking at one multi-national company as a title sponsor to put its name on the tournament and copy the Cricket Australia model by linking the Twenty20 competition to grass roots cricket. In Australia, children play in Big Bash competitions further identifying with the brand and competition,” as written by the English daily.

It can be hoped that there will be an overall increase in the revenue of the game and it can also fill up the hole created by the drop in the revenue of Test cricket in England. The Telegraph reported, “It could be more than double the current £75m per year the ECB receives for the whole of English cricket from Sky.”