The future of cricket as I see it.
Please note this post has nothing whatsoever to do with financial planning. It’s just something that’s been on my mind for a while.
100 years from now, maybe sooner, the Indian Premier League (IPL) will dominate cricket.
The season will run for 6 months, 30ish franchises will play 80ish games each season before a “post-season” determines the overall champions.
In so doing cricket will have become the biggest, richest, most watched bat and ball game in the world, ousting baseball in the process.
MLB
My model for the future of cricket is based on what happened to Major League Baseball (MLB) in the US.
From a handful of clubs, baseball grew and spread as the middle classes did. The richer Americans became, the more baseball there was, and the more baseball there was, the bigger the financials got for owners and players alike. Expansion was self-serving.
Compare India today with the US some 150 years ago and you’ll find important parallels.
Their middle class is growing at a furious rate and getting richer. READ THIS from the World Economic Forum for the facts.
And India is the biggest democracy in the world; the Government will do all they can not to interfere with cricket, in fact politicians will use it to promote themselves.
In contrast, it’s hard to think of anywhere else in the world where one sport is so dominant. India is cricket.
The MLB competes with basketball, American football, ice hockey and soccer played both professionally and in the colleges. [The biggest 15 stadia in the US are all college football stadia – CLICK HERE for the list.]
The one stark difference I can think of is population.
MLB is the richest bat and ball game in the world on the back of a population of c311m. India’s population is nearly four times the size and should be larger than China’s by 2022.
Already IPL earns more in sponsorship than MLB according to THIS ARTICLE.
As India’s middle class grows and gets richer, so will cricket. There’s no reason to not keep growing and expanding IPL.
As a result, all other forms of cricket will become subservient to the IPL.
Non-IPL teams
The other T20 leagues around the world will act as feeder leagues for the IPL.
Some will play at the same time as the IPL, others will cover the off season. Young talent will be nurtured there whilst fading stars will play out their last days.
That’s the way it works with MLB.
The US league dominates the scene. There are robust, well-paid leagues in Japan and South Korea (similar to second and third divisions) and then all sorts of off-season leagues in the Caribbean and some of the countries ringing it.
There’s also a vibrant minor league scene for the talent closest to moving up to MLB. Each MLB franchise has a “farm” system. Typically that comprises five minor league clubs at different levels plus a couple of teams for the out-and-out rookies.
That’s the future for a great many of the clubs in the UK, Australia and elsewhere. Cricket will still be played but much of the money will be coming from India and so developing young players will be the name of the game.
The players
There will be a “first team” squad of 40 with a match day squad of 15. With the number of games scheduled, rotation and “platooning” will be the name of the game.
Up to 250 players worldwide will be contracted to an IPL franchise.
The best of the best will earn $30m per season, the average will be $5m and the minimum $1m, for those in the 40-man squad. All in today’s money.
International cricket
International cricket will “survive” but only as a sideshow, a bit of a break from the intensity of IPL.
The Ashes and a couple of other big test series might still be about and players not in the season squad of 40 can expect to be released to play in these.
There will be international 50 over games too, but the World Cup will be nothing compared to the IPL post-season.
And international T20 will have died; it’s all about the IPL franchises, who don’t need their impact diluted or their revenues shared.
In conclusion
Sounds terrible, doesn’t it? Or does it?
Cricket will now employ, on wages, many hundreds more players, coaches and other support staff.
There will never have been so many paying spectators, easily topping 100m each year. The revenues will never have been healthier.
What started on 13 June 2003 in England will have blossomed into the biggest bat and ball game there is.
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