Sunday, September 05, 2010

IPL 2011 - All new format


Indian Premier League will come home with a new format in 2011. The GC(Governing Council) chaired by Sunil Gavaskar, MK Pataudi and Ravi Shastri have come up with the new format for IPL edition 4.
In each of the next three seasons, the IPL will comprise 70 league matches and four playoffs. The ten teams(including the two new teams, Pune and Kochi) will be split into two groups of five each.
An extension of the current home-and-away format would have stretched the season to 94 matches, which had prompted concerns of player burn-out. Franchise owners were also reluctant to reduce the minimum number of matches their team would play each season. These constraints have led to a convoluted format.

1.Every team will play the same number of league games (14, 7 home and 7 away) as in previous seasons with the following break-up:
a) Each team will play the other four in its group both home and away (eight matches),
b) Each team will play four of the teams in the other group once (four matches, either home or away)
c) it will play the remaining team in the other group twice, both home and away. A random draw will decide the composition of the groups as well as who plays whom across the groups once and twice.

2.The teams that finish first and second in the league table will contest the first playoff, which is effectively a semi-final. The loser of this match shouldn't loose heart. To know why, read on......
3. The teams that finish third and fourth will play each other in a knockout that is effectively a quarter-final.
4. The loser of the first Semi-Final will play the winner of the Quarter Final in a match that will decide the second finalist that will play the winner of first Semi-Final in the grand final.

Each of the ten franchises can retain up to four players( 3 Domestic Players and 1 Overseas Player only). The retained players must have been part of the franchise's registered squads for the 2010 season and will not be part of November's auction.

The franchise and the player it wishes to retain must come to a mutual agreement regarding the retention and the fee for the 2011 and 2012 seasons.

•$1.8 million per year for the first player retained
•$1.3 million per year for the second player retained
•$900,000 per year for the third player retained
•$500,000 per year for the fourth player retained

Therefore, if a franchise decides to retain four players, it will be charged $4.5 million per year and will have only $4.5 million to spend on other players, compared to the $9 million available to a franchise that retains no one. Also, the size of the squad is capped at 30 players(10 Overseas players and 20 Domestic Players). In all, the total number of players will be 300 in IPL4. But only 4 Overseas player can feature in the Final XI.

Hopefully, IPL4 will be a cracker of a contest rather than it cracking under the pressure of off-field controversies which plagued the last three editions.