5 Things you probably don't know about ICL

Indian Cricket League (ICL) was the first T20 league organized by including the overseas players. It came into the picture before IPL made its way to the spotlight. The T20 tournament got kicked off in a great style. But, before it could have taken a flight to glory, it ended up on a controversial note.

The league came into existence and was organized successfully for a couple of years before the management came into conflict with BCCI. The tournament comprised of 9 domestic teams and four international sides including World XI, India, Pakistan and Bangladesh.

It was a private league funded by a popular media organization, Zee Entertainment Enterprises. Many big players were part of the tournament like Moin Khan, Kapil Dev, Marvan Atapattu and many more. At that time, everyone would have expected that ICL will bring a drastic change in the dynamics of Indian cricket. However, it never happened and the league was folded back in 2009. The chances are quite slim that people would remember that league.

So, we have come out with some interesting facts related to the ICL:

1.Number of teams

In the inaugural season of ICL, only six teams took part in the tournament and they were Kolkata Tigers, Delhi Jets, Chandigarh Lions, Chennai Superstars, Hyderabad Heroes and Mumbai Champs. The first edition of the tournament reaped out lots of success.

All the teams were nationally located in the major cities of the country. This led to the introduction of three more teams in the 2nd edition of the tournament. Even the neighbouring countries also showed their interest in participating in an exciting league.

So, the names of the teams introduced were Ahmedabad Rockets (India), Dhaka Warriors (Bangladesh) and Lahore Badshahs (Pakistan).

2. ICL Winners 

The league witnessed two successive seasons before it was controversially discontinued. In the meantime, there were several teams that hogged the spotlight with brilliant performances but only one team ended up lifting the tournament trophy.

In the inaugural season, Chennai Superstars ended up winning the tournament by defeating Chandigarh Lions by 12 runs in the final. They can be regarded as one of the most successful teams in ICL as they managed to qualify into the knockout stages in its successive second season.

However, they failed in qualifying for the final. In the end, the newly introduced side Lahore Badshah emerged as the winner of the tournament in 2008-2009 season.

3. BCCI refused to give ICL recognition

The fallout of ICL began after they came in conflict with the BCCI, who denied giving recognition to the tournament. Actually, the cricket board officials never came onto an agreement to give them the status of an affiliated league.

Hence, the International Cricket Council (ICC) also followed on the footsteps of BCCI and said until they get the green signal from their own cricket board, ICC will also not give them the recognition.

The things soon went from bad to worse and ICL filed a petition against BCCI for their anti-competitive attempts to stop the ICL. However, the case was won by the cricket board and this turned out to be a major setback for the ICL management.

4. Players to play in ICL will not feature in international cricket

ICL’s decline started after they lost their case in Delhi High court against BCCI. They also issued a warning for the players, who were the part of the league. The court in their statement issued a statement for all the state cricket associations & the BCCI to terminate the contracts of players joining the ICL.

So, the players stepped back from taking part in the T20 tournament that turned out to be a major setback for ICL. The tournament gradually started fading away due to this rule.

Even, the newly introduced side from Dhaka comprised of many Bangladesh players gave air to another controversy as their own cricket board banned the players from international cricket for 10 years for taking part in the controversial tournament.

5. ICL forced BCCI to introduce their very own IPL

There was no doubt over the fact that ICL received lots of praise from the fans in its first couple of seasons before it was discontinued. Afterwards, BCCI sensed an opportunity of introducing their very own T20 league that was named as Indian Premier League (IPL).

So BCCI came out all guns blazing and banned all the stadiums and players associated with ICL. This saw the end of the league. Meanwhile, the cricket board began working on the blueprint of introducing their T20 league.

And the IPL was born in 2008 which received a huge response from the crowd and the players all over the world.  Now, it is rated as one of the biggest cricket leagues across the globe.