CLT20 : A conceptual failure

One of my friend is quite crazy about cricket. The very fact that he watches the complete ashes series justifies the statement. But when I asked whether he was following the on-going CLT20, he was like "Who cares? It is just another edition of a meaningless and boring tournament. "

His mental state about CLT20 is shared by most of the cricketing world. Just when one gets exausted by watching nearly two months of non-stop T20 action in the form of IPL(neglect premier leagues of other countries, as no one actually watches it), and lo! Within 3 months, another T20 tournament.

The concept is quite ambitious. Directly copied from the much-popular UEFA champions league, it was expected to be a huge success. The concept of bringing together the best T20 teams around the world to compete within a stage is a good idea indeed, but the negitives truely out-weight the positives.

First of all, cricket is played merely between 15 countries (8 of them play regularly). The domestic structure of the respective countries is nothing compared to the club system of football. So, the UEFA Champions league actually brings together the whole of european club football. Out of 200 or so clubs, merely 32 manage to get into the tournament’s group stage. It is a mini-world cup in itself. But in the small cricketing world, out of 30-40 or so T20 clubs, 10 of them play to be crowned as the world’s best T20 team. It seems fairly interesting, but when you see that out of 10 teams, 3 are from India, two each from Australia and South Africa, it just acts as a tournament between the ICC big bullies.

Now, as everyone knows, the BCCI was the brain-child of this tournament. And thus it’s monopoly is seen in the tournament. 1/3rd of the teams entering the tournament(including the qualification process) are from India. Now this abolishes the concept of bringing together the world’s best teams, as the places of T20 teams from countries like Sri Lanka and Pakistan are compromised to accomodate the IPL teams. In short, it has become a mini-IPL.

3 of the 5 editions of CLT20 were held in India, the other two being in South Africa. Did someone say it was a world wide tournament? Also, it is mainly done to target the Indian audience, the only few who actually watch this tournament. But still, the strategy is failing, as the TRP ratings are going down year by year. Conducting it in different countries every year would atleast spice up things due to different playing conditions. But again, thanks to BCCI monopoly, such a thing never happened.

To sum up things - The concept will never work in Cricket. It is too limited a sport, so the scope of popularity is quite dim. And with the packed cricketing schedule nowadays, fans would definitely take a rest while this meaningless tournament is held. Will this tournament last long? I don’t think so.