Indian Premier League and Cricket News by IPL Cricket Forum

Chennai Superkings has got another sponsor in the form of Aircel, one of the leading telecom companies in south.
Telecom services provider Aircel on Monday announced that the company would sponsor the Chennai Super Kings in the forthcoming Indian Premier League cricket tournament.

As the team sponsor for Chennai Super Kings, Aircel gets branding rights on the players uniform including their shirts and hats during the DLF IPL Championship, opportunities for in-stadia branding, sponsoring man-of-the-match trophies for matches happening in Chennai and several other brand activation opportunities.

The Chennai Super Kings’ team will be led by Mahendra Singh Dhoni and coached by former South African captain, Kepler Wessels.

Aircel COO, Gurdeep Singh said, “Aircel, is the leading cellular service provider in Chennai and Tamil Nadu, and hence an association with Chennai Super Kings, led by Dhoni was a natural fit.”

The Pakistan Cricket Board has been forced to postpone its national Twenty20 championship due to the Indian Premier league (IPL) starting April 18.

An official of the board said no dates had been set for the domestic T20 event although the original plan was to hold it early in the year.

“All the main players will be going to the IPL after the Bangladesh series. And the sponsors don’t want an event without the leading names,” the official said.

The T20 competition is one of the most successful domestic tournaments in Pakistan and the last three editions have drawn big crowds with all the leading players also making it a point to play in the event.

The official said the tournament would now probably be held sometime in August and could be renamed as the Pakistan Premier League.

“August is the best time for us to hold the competition now because all the players would be available to us,” he added.

A dozen Pakistani players are signed up to play in the IPL.

After bagging a fat pay check, Australian all-rounder Andrew Symonds wants to help Deccan Chargers of Hyderabad win the title in the inaugural Indian Premier League (IPL) starting Friday.

“I must thank the owners for bidding for me in such a big way. It came as a surprise. But now my ambition is to win the tournament. Money is definitely a factor. I think IPL is a new frontier in cricket,” he said.

On the possible clash between international assignments and IPL, Symonds said: “This is something that should never happen. I think the cricket boards and the ICC should see to it that there is a window for IPL.”

He also said that since Twenty20 is a very fast format, there would be no place for sledging.

Controversial Australian batsman Andrew
Symonds,who has been brought by Deccan Chargers at a whopping price of
$1.35 million, the highest after Mahendra Singh Dhoni, is all set to
make peace with Indian crowd and his ‘foe’ Harbhajan Singh in the
forthcoming DLF-IPL Twenty20 tournament.

Symonds said he had not seen other team list.
“But from what I have heard, Matthew Hayden’s (Chennai Super Kings)
team is a strong one.”

Lalit Modi, Chairman and Commissioner of the DLF Indian Premier League (IPL), who met representatives of the Indian Newspaper Society (INS) here on Saturday, claimed to The Hindu that the problems relating to the contentious terms and conditions of the Media Guidelines – even after they were revised once by IPL – may have been resolved.

“I have dropped the last clause, allowed the websites of the newspapers to upload a reasonable number of pictures [instead of six] and clarified certain clauses to them. We have agreed in principle on all matters,” Mr. Modi told this correspondent.

Clause dropped

The following clause has been dropped altogether: “IPL may request publications to provide for use and reproduction, free of charge, worldwide and without limit in time any photographs/images captured by the Accredited Party at any Ground and the Accredited Party shall make the same available to IPL.”

Another clause restricted newspapers to the use of only six pictures per match on their websites. According to this particular clause, “No online use or publication or syndication of any such still photographic images is allowed except for the website of the publication. Only used photos can be put on website of a publication. In the media gallery of the website, six more pictures other than those used in the publication can be used.” IPL has now agreed to the use of a “reasonable number of pictures.”

It is understood that the national news agency Press Trust of India (PTI) would be allowed to supply pictures to general websites, but not to cricket-dedicated ones. Mr. Modi, who has discussed website-related issues with PTI’s Executive Editor V.S. Chandrashekar, said he would prefer the latter to make an official statement on the matter.

The INS representatives who met Mr. Modi were: Messrs. H. N. Cama (Mumbai Samachar), Pratap Pawar and Abhijeet Pawar (Sakal Group), Devendra Darda (Lokmat) and Paresh Nath (Delhi Press).

There has been no response yet to Mr. Modi’s climbdown by the Editors’ Guild of India and the Indian Newspaper Society, which had earlier termed the guidelines unacceptable.