T20 Champions League will now return in a new format, decision taken in ICC meeting

During the annual meeting of the International Cricket Council (ICC) held in Singapore, member countries demanded to start the Men’s T20 Champions League. The ICC accepted it with majority and said that the league will start from September next year.

Giving information about the ICC meeting, two specific sources said, “The ICC has now formed a working group, which has been given the responsibility to present the global cricket calendar in a new format before 2027.” The ICC Calendar Working Group will consist of eight members, including Cricket Australia CEO Todd Greenberg, England and Wales Cricket Board CEO Richard Gould and ICC’s newly appointed Chief Executive Officer Sanjog Gupta. The working group will present its interim findings and recommendations to ICC Board Chairman Jay Shah before the end of 2025.

Tough decisions will have to be taken to improve the game

ICC CEO Sanjog Gupta said at the MCC’s World Cricket Connects Panel 2023 at Lord’s, “You have to take tough decisions. There are very clear signs of what cricket fans want. There is also enough data to tell in which direction the game is moving.”

“If you continue to offer a product that no one wants, then on one hand that product will continue to suffer, on the other hand the ecosystem around that product will also continue to be affected.”

Let us tell you that the T20 Champions League started in 2008, and ran till 2014. The then broadcaster ESPN shut it down after paying an increased rights fee of about one billion dollars to reduce its losses. This investment was made at a time when ESPN lost the initial rights of the Indian Premier League.

This league was a joint effort of Australian Cricket, BCCI and South Africa Cricket. Interestingly, the funds raised from the ESPN-Star deal helped provide the initial funding for the Big Bash League in its initial years, which later led to it becoming a successful business by 2013.