What we know about Cricket SA’s new T20 League

While Cricket South Africa (CSA) still haven’t nailed down all aspects of its new T20 League,  a few more details emerged on Wednesday following a joint media conference between the governing body and official broadcaster, the SABC.

Here’s what we know about the controversial new venture.

It has a window and its number of teams

The tournament will run from 9 November to 16 December, with 32 matches between six teams.

The six franchises and its venue will be determined following a bid process from parties who expressed interest.

There are general guidelines for the composition of squads

Each team will have 16 players, of which a minimum of three and a maximum of four players can be overseas-based.

These players can either be foreigners or local players who have signed Kolpak agreements with English county sides.

There will be a player draft

According to CSA chief Thabang Moroe, the process of assigning players to teams will be reasonably simple.

Since all six teams are owned by CSA, there won’t be any bidding on players.

“What will happen is when we’ve concluded our talks with the players who’ve expressed interest in participating, the various teams’ management teams will have to sit down and compile a possible list of players they want to pick,” said Moroe.

“On the draft day (scheduled for 17 October) the teams will pick players on a round-to-round basis. You pick a name and then you move on to the next team, who make their pick. You want a fair draft, so to speak.”

There are no privately-owned teams

“CSA own all the teams. In the next couple of days, we’ll be announcing the venues for the six teams, which will serve as their respective bases,” said Moroe.

“The CEOs of existing franchises from those stadiums will act as managers for the relevant league team. They will announce the name of the teams and their logos. In turn, they’ll appoint the coaches. It’s a reality that these teams might just opt for the existing franchise coaching teams but we’ve encouraged them to look a bit beyond in terms of coaching figures.”

Sponsorship will be announced soon but teams won’t be able to arrange their own sponsorship (yet)

“At the moment, we’re centralising everything. We’ve adopted the NFL model and there’s quite a simple reason why we’ve gone that route,” said Moroe.

“Obviously the difficult state of the economy is a factor but we also want a ‘clean-looking’ product from a branding point of view. We do have a couple of sponsors lined up. We’re working on tying them up. Teams will operate centrally from a commercial point of view for now but there will hopefully be an opportunity in future for them to become autonomous.”

Indian cricket administrators will help with operational aspects

“I’m delighted to announce that that the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has accepted our invitation to make some of their senior administrators, who have extensive experience in running the Indian Premier League (IPL), available to assist with the smooth running of our tournament,” said Moroe.

“Their experience will be invaluable and will assist in ensuring that the League is one of international standing.”

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