The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) may transform the match timings of the Indian Premier League (IPL) from the 2023 season onward. The BCCI plans to get back the old timings of 4 PM and 8 PM, thus leaving the current ones 3:30 PM and 7:30 PM.
Initially, the IPL matches used to start at 4 PM and 8 PM in the afternoon or at night when Sony Sports Network were the broadcaster. The schedule was followed for ten seasons but due to the transformation in broadcasters, the time got changed too.
Their current broadcasters, Star Sports had requested BCCI to prepone the matches by 30 minutes in the afternoon and in the evening as well. The afternoon games used to start from 3:30 Pm and the evening games from 7:20 PM. This helped to optimize their monetization as Star Sports stated that preponing the games would help to get extra 30 minutes of the main time slot.
BCCI’s preferred start times for double-headers being 4 pm and 8 pm Indian Standard Time,” the board said in official communication.
Star’s deal will expire after this season’s end and BCCI will switch back to the genuine timings. Friday (May 20) is the deadline for interested parties to buy ITT documents to bid for the media rights.
The Board stated that “Pursuant to requests from various interested parties, BCCI has now decided to further extend the date for purchasing the ITT documents till May 20, 2022. The procedure for purchasing the ITT documents is laid down in Exhibit I. All other terms contained in the Exhibit I (including the non-refundable ITT fee amount) shall be applicable herein,”
The bidding is set to take place on June 12. This time a lot of companies are expected to use their financial strength to grab the IPL media rights.
Star, Sony, Viacom 18, Amazon, Dream11, South Africa’s SuperSport and United Kingdom’s Sky Sports have bought the ITT document.
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