Every legitimate ball in the IPL will be worth crores

The much-anticipated media rights of Indian Premier League (IPL) went under the hammer today. The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) auctioned the digital rights as well along with the media rights for the Indian subcontinent and the rest of the world. Star India won the auction as they snaffled the global media as well as digital rights for a whopping amount of INR 16,347.50 crore. If the calculations are taken deep, every legitimate delivery bowled in IPL for next 5 years would be worth 162,741 UKP (UK Pounds) roughly INR  1.35 crores.

The amount is so large that for the first time since its inception, the broadcast rights for a single IPL match is worth more than India’s international game at home. Star India won the bidding war against the big fishes like Sony Pictures, Facebook, Airtel, Reliance Jio, Times Internet, and others to win the rights for the next five years from 2018-2022. Previously, Sony had bought the rights for INR 8200 crore for 10 years which is almost half the money and double the period.

BCCI expected such a huge amount

BCCI was excited to witness the huge interest shown by the various stakeholders and were already expecting the rights to be sold for such a gigantic amount. Sony Pictures was again in line to retain the contract and the war was majorly contested between them and Star. Eventually, Star emerged victorious took the entire pie. They won all the media, digital and world wide rights of broadcasting the cash-rich league.

BCCI CEO Rahul Johri had said last week that 4th September would a historic day for the IPL and would churn out some unexpected numbers from the auction. “Monday’s auction could produce historic numbers. While I am not in a position to predict numbers, our primary focus is to deliver a transparent and robust bidding process for each and every stakeholder,” Johri had said.

Star India already has the broadcasting rights for all the home matches of the Indian team. The CEO of Star, Uday Shankar, was elated after the announcement and thanked BCCI for running the transparent process for the auction.

“I’d just like to convey my delight at being finally able to bring the IPL to what we believe is the rightful home for cricket in this country and elsewhere. We would also like to thank BCCI for choosing us as their appropriate partners. We complement BCCI for running such an immaculately transparent process,” Uday said.

For the first time since the IPL began, the broadcast rights for a single IPL match are worth more than an India home international. #IPL

— Anand Vasu (@anandvasu) September 4, 2017

Every legitimate ball in an IPL match is now worth UKP 162,741. Utter madness.

— Anand Vasu (@anandvasu) September 4, 2017