The Adani Group made the biggest splash in the bidding war to own a franchise in the women’s T20 league in Mumbai on Wednesday. Men’s IPL team owners Mumbai Indians, Royal Challengers Bangalore and Delhi Capitals, along with Capri Global Holdings, bagged the other four franchises.
The tournament will be known as the Women’s Premier League (WPL), and the teams will be based in Ahmedabad, Mumbai, Bangalore, Delhi and Lucknow.
In the end, the BCCI raked in Rs 4,669.99 crore which it will earn over a period of 10 years. The BCCI had earlier sold the media rights to Viacom 18 for Rs 951 crore, which translates to a value of Rs 7.09 crore per match for the 2023-27 period.
Calcutta will go unrepresented in the WPL for at least the first three years since none of the winning franchises put in a bid for the city. Kolkata Knight Riders did bid for Calcutta but didn’t feature in the top five. There’s a provision to add two more franchises after the first three years of the tournament.
The Adani Group came up with the highest bid of Rs 1,289 crore for Ahmedabad, followed by Mumbai, Bangalore, Delhi and Lucknow (see box).
Apart from the winners, the other 11 entities who bid were 369 Slingshot SportsVenture Ltd, Amrit Lila Enterprise Pvt. Ltd, KPL DreamCricket Pvt Ltd, APL SportsPvt. Ltd, Knight Riders SportsPvt. Ltd, Oam Industries Ltd (Haldiram’s), Royal Multisport Pvt. Ltd, Sun TV Network Ltd, Shriram Value Service Ltd, Torrent InvestmentPvt Ltd and Yadu International Ltd.
The inaugural edition is tentatively scheduled from March 4 to 26 and a decision on whether it will be held in Mumbai or would be limited to two cities will be taken shortly.
The players’ auction could be held early next month.
