Saudi Arabia is planning to launch a global T20 league with a huge budget. Saudi Arabia will invest around 6000 crore taka behind this plan of a former Australian cricketer. For this, they are continuing to communicate while waiting for the approval of the ICC. However, the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) has reacted negatively when the matter of such a secret plan spread.
ECB Chief Executive Richard Gould has commented that there is no ‘opportunity or demand’ to implement such a plan. Recently, various private institutions have invested 24281 crore taka ($2 billion) in England’s eight-team franchise tournament ‘The Hundred’. In other words, the Saudi Arabian league may come into conflict with the big project of this English tournament. Not only the Hundred, but any franchise tournament in the world may be adversely affected by the Saudi-Australian plan. The IPL may also lose its power!
Taking all factors into account, ECB official Gould argued, ‘There are concerns about the busy international calendar, the existing franchise leagues around the world and the workload of the players. Therefore, there may be no opportunity or demand for the implementation of any such idea (of Saudi Arabia). We do not support such an arrangement.’
It is true that due to various franchise tournaments around the world and busy international schedules, the physical strain on cricketers is increasing. At the same time, the risk of injury is also being created. Harry Brooke, who was also named in the IPL considering the workload, later withdrew himself from it. Due to which he was banned for two years from the Indian franchise tournament. On the other hand, Aussie captain Pat Cummins’ manager Neil Maxwell and the Australian Cricket Association have also shown new solutions in organizing this global league in Saudi Arabia amidst the international schedule.
In this context, the Australian media outlet ‘The Sydney Morning Herald’ said that this tournament with an 8-team T20 format will be held in a similar way to the tennis Grand Slam. Where matches will be held at four different locations at different times of the year. The tennis Grand Slam competitions ‘Australian Open, French Open, Wimbledon and US Open’ are held four times a year. Keeping in mind the busy schedule of international cricket, the new T20 league will also be organized in such a way that there is no conflict with existing international matches and T20 leagues (IPL, PSL, BPL or Big Bash).
According to the media outlet, Saudi Arabia’s ‘SRJ Sports Investments’ will be the main investor in the new T20 league. For this, they have allocated about 500 million US dollars (about 6,070 crore taka in Bangladeshi currency).
