Brand OPL is worth Rs 3.7 cr now

The Orissa Premier League (OPL), a state-level Twenty20 cricket format created in line with Indian Premier League, has raked in Rs 3.7 crore for the Orissa Cricket Association (OCA) following the auction of 10 teams for the event.

The valuations are little higher than the estimates of OCA, said an official. “We thought it would be around Rs 3 crore, but it (the valuation) went beyond our expectation,” said Ashirbad Behera, secretary, OCA.

There would be a total of 44 matches in the first edition of OPL, including two semifinals and a final. The inaugural match on May 22, the semifinals and the final would be played at the Barabati stadium. The winning team will get a cash prize of Rs 4 lakh and the runners up Rs 2 lakh.

 

Bangalore-based Das Capital Management and Advisors Private Limited, which has bagged the telecast right of the matches for a fee of Rs 10 lakh, is negotiating with a couple of state and national sports channels for live telecast of matches.

The channels being approached included OTV, ETV and DD (Odia) for regional broadcasting and ESPN, Ten Sports and Neo Sports on national platform. The business model for telecasting of the matches will be worked out soon, Behera said.

OCA has created a pool of 341 players of different grades to be auctioned on May 13.The franchisees can spend maximum Rs 8 lakh to buy the players. The base price of grade A player is fixed at Rs 60,000, for grade B it is Rs 40,000, for grade C, Rs 30,000, grade D, Rs 20,000 and grade E players (from the respective districts) will have a base price of Rs 10,000. Each team would be allowed to purchase 18 players, of which a maximum of 12 would be between A to D grade, while the remaining six would be from E grade. The teams can field maximum eight players from grade A,B,C,D and a minimum of three players from grade E. The teams would be divided into two groups and each team of the group will play two matches with each other. The matches will be played at Cuttuck, Bhubaneswar, Angul and Paradip.