SOUTH Africa has raised the stakes in its bid to host the Indian Premier League’s second tournament, promising hotel and ground discounts, priority visa processing for the teams and weather of which the English can only dream.
Despite earlier indicating that England was the favoured alternative venue for the glamorous Twenty20 series, IPL chairman Lalit Modi appeared yesterday to have switched preferences following a day of intensive lobbying by Cricket South Africa and the South African Government.
The IPL announced late on Sunday that it was shifting the series offshore because the Indian Government could not guarantee security for the April 10 to May 24 event, which clashes with the staging of the month-long national elections.
With just 15 days until its scheduled start, a decision on the new host venue is expected to be announced today.
Before heading to meet first with South Africa and then England cricket officials yesterday, Modi said the changeable English weather during April and May, combined with a clash of events there, could complicate the plan to host the IPL tournament.
“Weather is a problem,” he said. “There is 70 per cent chance of the games being disrupted by rain. The IPL will also be clashing with the London marathon and a number of Test matches, which will be blocking hotel rooms.”
Earlier, however, he told Indian news channel CNN-IBN: “I don’t think you should be looking at weather as an issue. In India, we play cricket in November, December, January when it is also very, very cold.”
He added that the IPL “would bring $100 million of revenue to the British economy. Anybody in a recession would want to have us.”
Last year’s inaugural tournament in India generated $US900m ($1.3 billion) in television rights alone. On top of television earnings, England boasts one of the world’s largest Indian diasporas, guaranteeing good crowds and gate-takings for the high-dollar tournament.
But British police warned yesterday that they may not have enough time to ensure adequate security for the event and have criticised the England and Wales Cricket Board for not consulting security agencies before declaring its readiness to stage the IPL.
“Frankly, they’ve been getting a bit ahead of themselves,” one security official said. “There is a lot more work to be done before people are confident about the logistics and the security issues.”
British police already have their hands full next month as the country hosts the G20 summit of world leaders, the FA Cup soccer semi-finals and the London marathon.
South Africa’s domestic cricket season is due to end the day before the IPL is scheduled start, while in England, the IPL would clash with the county program and its home series against the West Indies.
South African broadcaster Supersport also owns the rights to both the IPL and any international matches. In Britain, Sky has exclusive rights for England internationals and would not welcome competition from IPL rights broadcaster Setanta if the series were played in parallel.
As well, the cost of shifting the IPL to South Africa is likely to be significantly cheaper than playing in England.
The South African Government is understood to have promised to rush through more than 1000 visas for the eight teams in time for the event and the country’s tourism board has also lent its support to the bid.
But Cricket South Africa chief executive Gerald Majola refused to speculate on his country’s chances of hosting the venue before the overnight (AEDT) meeting with Modi.
“Until I meet with Mr Modi and BCCI officials and know exactly what they want and how they think this should proceed, then I cannot say where we stand,” he told the Cricinfo website.
A BCCI official told The Australian yesterday that England was still the board’s preferred option and that talk of poor weather and a clash of schedules was designed to squeeze a better deal out of the ECB.
“In my view, nothing has changed except that they’re now playing hard ball,” the official said.
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