Business of Sport Business of Sport Ep.38: Vikram Banerjee, Director of Business Operations @ The ECB, ‘Why we’re selling The Hundred franchises’
Vikram is the Director of Business Operations at the England & Wales Cricket Board and is the man in charge of selling stakes in The Hundred franchises. Vikram was a professional cricketer before taking up his position at the ECB, playing short and long form cricket around the world.
Domestic cricket has been under pressure in the UK. The international game is strong, franchise tournaments like the IPL and Big Bash have thrived, but county cricket, the foundations of the game, has struggled to sustain the attention. The Hundred was created not just to form a new short-form league to compete with the major international franchise tournaments, but to bring value back into the English game.
After 4 years of successful implementation, Vik is now overseeing the ‘privatisation’ of the 8 franchises; an opportunity to bring in private investment, injecting millions of pounds into the cricket ecosystem. Franchise leagues are hot property. How will The Hundred franchises compare to not just other cricket assets, but the crop of new teams and leagues all competing for huge capital injections?
On this week’s show we discuss:
New Forms of Cricket:
- Why the sport needed to speak to a new audience to maintain its position as one of the most followed games globally.
- What do you need to protect and what is open to change; how decisions are made to attract a new audience but maintain the integrity of traditional formats.
- The IPL was a game changer and showed the world how it can be done. Is it replicable or a unique product of India’s cricket mad population?
- Short form cricket has helped facilitate the creation of more global sports stars who are integral for attracting a youth audience as interested in following the individual as a team.
The Hundred
- How did the ECB come up with the concept of The Hundred and what were the key challenges in implementing the tournament?
- How does the current ownership structure of the franchises look and why was it set up this way?
- You need the top players in the world to be playing in your tournament. How do you attract players to ensure they participate on a regular basis?
- Why now is the right time to explore the privatisation of the teams, and the impact it’ll have on the wider English cricket ecosystem.
- Salaries: What do the top players get paid in The Hundred compared to other short form tournaments?
Overcoming Crickets major challenges:
- Create an element of jeopardy; you need to have a system that distributes the best players equally to ensure competition remains. How do you do this?
- Tribalism drives engagement. How do you build affinity to new sporting organisations?
- Align the calendar and make sure the top tournaments are not competing with each other for eyeballs.
- Break the gender barriers in cricket. The Hundred combines both the men and women’s teams in the same package. Why is this so important?
- In England in particular, demonstrate that cricket is a sport for everyone.
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