Indian Premier League has set the benchmark for league based Twenty20 tournament all around the world. The money spinning tournament, organised by the richest cricketing board in the world of cricket, Board of Cricket Control in India, would be entering its seventh edition in the year 2014. Along with the phenomenal viewership which the tournament has beckoned in the last half a decade, the tournament has also been marred with controversies since its inaugural edition.
Last year was probably the grimmest for the glitz and razzmatazz filled indian premier league owing to the cropping up of spot fixing and betting scandal during the final stages of the tournament. However, this did not dent the following of the league. The forthcoming edition of IPL in 2014 would involve player auctions on a broader scale with almost every involved cricketer being put into the pool for auctions. The protocol for the auctions has not been made public until yet; but it is touted that some handful number of players would be retained by their parent league side while the remainder would be put into the auction pool.
Not just the auctions being held on a much larger scale as compared to IPL 5 and IPL 6, the ipl 7 would also encounter some new developments in the tournament. Pune Warriors India, IPL Pune franchise owned by Sahara, which became the costliest IPL franchise to come into effect during the fourth edition of IPL, had pulled out from the league on grounds of differences with BCCI. Though this is not the first time that Pune Warriors India has pulled out of IPL, but if they continue with their stand, they might not feature in ipl 2014.
A new team could be seen filling the void created by Pune Warriors India’s absence. Gujarat is touted to be in the reckoning. Further, the 2014 edition of IPL would be second with Pepsi as its title sponsor and would see Sony Six as the official broadcaster of the league. In all the past 6 editions, another channel of Multi Screen Media, Sony Max, has been IPL’s official broadcaster.