When Zee launched the Indian Cricket League in the face of a take-no-prisoners campaign of opposition from the Board of Control for Cricket in India last year, there was scepticism galore on whether the Subhash Chandra-backed league would bat it out. Particularly after the the BCCI announced plans for its own league shortly thereafter.
ICL, however, successfully staged two events despite all the hurdles thrown in its way. The Indian Premier League kicking off on 18 April notwithstanding, Zee Sports business head Himanshu Mody is confident that his cricket endeavour will hold its own.
Indiantelevision.com's Ashwin Pinto caught up with Mody to ascertain his views on the progress made and future plans.
Excerpts:
Firstly, congratulations on having been able to deliver the second edition of the ICL despite the best efforts of the BCCI to skewer you. How has the experience been different from the first edition? |
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What were the learnings from the event that you will take, going forward? |
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How is the event being expanded upon this year? |
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How succesful have you been thus far in infrastructure and grassroot talent development? |
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A notable feature this time round was that there was an increase in spectators in the stadia. Has some sort of a spectator/viewer connect with the state teams happened? |
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Simulcasting the event on Ten Sports and Zee Sports has ramped up viewership quite significantly. What have been the average combined ratings? Have they been up to expectations or have they exceeded your brand partners' expectations? |
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Was it a challenge to get sponsors on board given the BCCI stance?
The second event has been a big hit and on the back of that we launched a tri series between an Indian XI and a World XI. We sold most of our inventory for this. The likes of Pepsi, HUL and Vodafone have come on board. |
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And what of the other cricket boards? Do you see a softening of their stances vis-a-vis the ICL and what could be the catalyst for it?
The international governing body needs to take a call on what is more important. In soccer for instance, club soccer contributes more revenue as opposed to countries playing against each other. Cricket must decide if it wants to go down this route. If that happens, then country versus country matches will have to come down. If, however, it decides that the country format is more important, then the IPL could be limited in terms of matches played. |
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How has ICL fared businesswise? Could you offer any idea of the kind of investments that have been pumped in? |
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Where have the revenues come from and how does it compare with the inaugural edition?
ICL was aired in several countries including UK, US, Pakistan, the Middle East, Africa, Southeast Asia, Australia and New Zealand. We did deals with international broadcasters for ICL including Showtime in the Middle East, Starhub in Singapore and Astro in |
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The ICL is unique in that everything - whether it be telecast rights, teams, stadia - is owned by the promoters. Therefore, by extension, it's Essel that has to spend on development, promotion and marketing of every aspect of the event. With IPL as a rival, in effect you're confronting the power of 10 - not just a powerful cricket board but eight strong franchises as well as an established television network for share of mind. Doesn't that become a huge challenge?
If there is no India cricket in a certain period, then the ICL becomes a strong proposition. If you can have many news channels, I don't see why two leagues cannot co-exist. We can have as many events as we like with all our players. |
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Actor Mithun Chakraborty has picked up a stake in the Kolkata ICL team. What are the future opportunities for stakes in teams?
We will, therefore, be selective about whom we choose to partner. We need to know the drive they have and what their objective to invest is. |
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With the BCCI's league being launched next week, what impact will this have on ICL in terms of retaining both local and international talent and viewer interest? In the present context, the ICL has a shelf life as a low-cost, lower value alternative to the IPL. But if these eight franchisees are going to expand in a big way, what will be left over for the ICL to pick up might just be the crumbs. Are some of these fears being expressed?
A mature sports market allows for trading, though. The players have contracts with us and if somebody wants them, then they will have to pay us accordingly. That is how sports clubs operate globally. A player cannot simply break his contract. Our stated objective has been to have talent at the grassroots level. So we did not go out and try to get the likes of Sachin, Dravid.
What we do is in line with what Zee does if you look at shows like Sa Re Ga Ma or India's Best (Cinestar Ki Khoj). We short-listed 15 Indian players who we felt were the best. They played in the tri series. The fight they showed was commendable against a global bowling attack. |
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The flip side to ICL is that many cricket boards, including Pakistan, are peeved that cricketers were taken. Do you feel that this will negatively affect your ability to go after their TV rights? I do not think that there is a conflict over here. The businesses are separate. If our bid is the highest, then it will come to us. A good price is what any board would look for. The best man wins. I don't think that the board will be concerned about who offers the highest. |
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How is the relationship with Ten Sports working out?
The Uefa Champions League sometimes has two games at the same time. So we air one match. In fact, we started doing this before we partnered with them. This offers the power of two. |
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You are also doing an initiative Goal 2010. How did this idea come about and what progress has been made?
Our focus is at the grassroots level. We need to emerge as champions at the Asia level by 2010. We should be among the top five teams in Asia. Ten Sports airs domestic football in the Middle East. We are also working with the AIFF at tweaking the format of domestic football. |
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Is the appeal of soccer moving beyond the three states of Goa, Kerala and West Bengal? Yes. It is getting popular in parts of states like Gujarat and Maharashtra. |
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Do you think corporatisation will help sports like soccer and hockey to move forward? It can certainly help soccer. Hockey, however, is on a downturn not just in India but also abroad. In soccer, you have 32 teams playing the World Cup. In hockey just seven or eight teams play the event. Even in those countries the popularity is not as high as it should be. |
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How is Zee Sports faring on the distribution front? The ICL has done us a lot of good. We have achieved 50 per cent connectivity. This rose from 25 per cent over the last three months. |
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What property acquisitions were recently made?
India is a unique country in that there are several sports channels but only one sport dominates. In other countries there are only two sports channels but multiple sports are followed. This is why the price of rights are going up dramatcially in India due to |
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Finally on the advertising front brands at the moment are not sure about how to use sport beyond cricket. Do you see this changing in the near future?
This, though, has been built over several years. Indian companies are realising that they should invest in sport over a long term. The advertiser has to invest with the sports federation. |