IPL 2021 New Teams: “BCCI might postpone the induction of new teams to 2022,” BCCI official.
IPL 2021 New Teams: The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) might look to introduce new IPL teams in 2022. The lack of time in between to carry out all the processes can put BCCI to this decision. The news of the addition of the two new franchises has been too much intensified in the recent past.
The lack of time for the actions to be taken has increased the heat of the issue. The final decision is yet to be taken by the board. The Annual General Meeting (AGM) on 24th December will end all the wait for the decision.
According to the report of Inside Sports who spoke to one of the officials of BCCI said, time is a major issue for us right now. According to the level of talents we have, we definitely need an expansion but time is something we need to take care of.
Everything has to be finalized between December and February. All the tenders, Player’s Auctions, and most importantly communicating with the existing franchise can be a hectic task.
For the Auctions to be held, we have to carry out Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy (SMAT) games at the same time we can also take Ranji Trophy into the consideration. Both tournaments are a must if Auctions are to be conducted.
BCCI official on IPL 2021:
“Time is too short for the introduction of the new teams for IPL in 2021. Tendering, players auction and most importantly getting all the stakeholders on the same page will be really challenging in the short-time span. We are of the view, any addition to the team should only happen for IPL 2022“, a BCCI official told InsideSport.
The board is considering two franchises for the induction in IPL. Ahmedabad is one of the first cities to get the franchise while Lucknow, Kanpur, Pune can be the other.
“The board’s broadcasting deals with Star will end in 2021. After that, we can introduce new teams so that the partnership values can be increased. That would be a fair deal. But we need to look up to AGM for the final decision.”
On Thursday, BCCI also announced India vs England series. England will tour India in February for 4 Tests, five T20Is, and three ODIs. The tour will end on March 28. Roughly a week will be left for the players to take part in IPL.
Looking up to the schedule, India will be the last option to host IPL 2021. If the Covid-19 conditions do not recover till that time, it would become really difficult for the board to conduct the Indian T20 League safely.
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