In a miserably humid April evening last year, Bengaluru FC defeated Dempo SC in Margao to win its first, historic I-League title. This was the country’s primary football league competition — an annual championship for India’s top teams, decided over seven, hard months — and Bengaluru’s triumph was hugely significant; momentous, even. To anyone watching, though, that was far from evident. Three-quarters of the Fatorda Stadium was empty, the players’ cheers and whoops of delight echoing up and around its vacant terraces. What little noise the crowd made — itself something of a wonder — came from a dozen fans from Bengaluru who were tucked high up in the West Stand. Dempo, a five-time champion playing on home turf, was supported only by a tired handful of men, some disappointed, some uninterested. At the final whistle, they all trooped out mournfully into the silent, still night.
Later, in the winter of that same year, when Kerala Blasters and FC Goa met in the same arena, it seemed that the whole of Margao had pitched up. Even an hour before kick-off, a long line of vehicles clogged the road outside the main gates; cars and motorbikes — all festooned in FC Goa colours — queuing up to park in the neighbouring maidan . Fatorda was an anarchic ocean of people, flags and plastic horns everywhere, with not an empty seat in sight. There were women, kids, teenagers and middle-aged men, all of whom had screamed themselves hoarse by the end of the 90 minutes. Zico’s Goa won 3-0, and it took the merry throngs forever to disperse, leaving policemen struggling to clear a path for the team bus. This, in all its mad glory, was the Indian Super League, the fourth biggest football competition in the world in terms of average attendance.
Star players (whatever their age), celebrity owners, high-decibel promotion and excellent TV production values: this was football with a generous injection of glamour, and served to a hungry, enthralled audience. The ISL or Indian Super League is one of a number of such new-age, professional, franchise-based leagues that have emerged since the advent of the Indian Premier League or IPL for cricket in 2008. Badminton (Indian Badminton League), hockey (Hockey India League), and kabaddi (Pro Kabaddi League) all have active competitions in the same mould now, while wrestling (PWL) (Pro-Wrestling League) and table tennis have taken big steps in that direction, recently launching their own events.
“Slowly, people have realised that if they do a two-month league, there is a window they can push it through, which is why we’ve seen so many leagues emerge,” says Indranil Das Blah, CEO of the ISL team, Mumbai City, and partner at CAA-KWAN, a sports marketing and entertainment firm. “These leagues don't take over the entire calendar. In that sense, IPL was the trendsetter. Plus, cricket has become so cluttered and expensive that brands have started looking at other sports.”
PKL took India by storm, transforming the face of what had been seen as a hard, but unfashionable, sport. The broadcaster, Star Sports, announced that PKL’s inaugural season (2014) drew a total of 435 million TV viewers, making it the second-most-watched sports event in India after IPL. PKL’s second season, which concluded last month, saw average Television Viewer Ratings or TVRs rise as high as 56 per cent from the first edition, according to data on the TAM website.
During the PKL last year, somewhere in the warren of rooms inside the Sree Kanteerava Indoor Stadium, in Bengaluru, Charu Sharma (Director, Mashal Sports, promoters of the PKL) reflected on the success of the tournament. “I realised what a powerful, energetic game it was and how much pan-India popularity it enjoyed. I knew that this was a game that must do better,” he said. “Urban India follows what it sees on TV. Sport thrives on live TV coverage. And what was the coverage for Kabaddi before this? Virtually zero. That gap has been plugged.”
That PKL raised the profile of the game and those of the players is beyond doubt. Bengaluru Bulls’ Ajay Thakur spoke of being recognised at airports. “They know who Anup Kumar is. They know who Rakesh Kumar is. It’s as if we’re Virat Kohli and Sachin Tendulkar,” he said. His teammate, Dharmaraj Cheralathan, spoke of life in his neighbourhood in Thanjavur, Tamil Nadu, grinding to a halt when he played.
“Kabaddi was a success because of how phenomenally well it was packaged,” says Blah. “It’s a huge, huge factor. The ISL too — we’ve never seen Indian football in that avatar . The same thing with IPL, packaged brilliantly both on and off the field. But you need to have the fundamentals in place for it to be successful — quality Indian players, people you can look up to as heroes. If not that, you need international players that people have heard of. That’s why kabaddi was a bit of a surprise.”
IBL had the advantage of a truly world-class field, notwithstanding the absence of Chinese players. (A second edition is still awaited after the first in 2013, but it is likely to be held sometime next year.) “With clever marketing you can make a tournament big but you can’t replace the fact that you have the best players in the world currently playing,” says Vijay Lancy. He is the CEO of Banga Beats, IBL’s Bengaluru franchise, a former badminton international player and a gold medallist from the 1997 National Games. “There was Lee Chong Wei, Carsten Mogensen, Saina Nehwal and Carolina Marin. You were not watching ex-players or players ranked 70 and 80 in the world. These were active, top players. How often would a fan in India get the opportunity to watch Lee Chong Wei?”
Of course, there’s the money — the sort of sums football, hockey and kabaddi in the country have not previously been associated with — but young, Indian players have benefited in other ways too. “Someone like Akshay Dewalkar, who is one of the best in India at doubles, gets the chance to play with Carsten Mogensen, who’s the best in the world at doubles,” says Lancy. “Players get to observe top players, be with them. It’s great.”
Indian hockey forward Nikkin Thimmaiah feels that the money, while a happy development, is not the only upside to playing in the Hockey India League. “Every young player dreams of being seen on TV,” says the 24-year-old, who turns out for Uttar Pradesh Wizards. “My parents and friends were excited because they could watch me play on a regular basis. I wasn’t following the auction (where he was sold for $59,000 — or Rs.39,13,175 — up from his base price of $2,000 or Rs.1,32,610.90). I was happy when S.K. Uthappa (teammate) broke the news to me, but I would have played for any amount.”
Not all such sporting ventures have had it smooth. The Indian Volley League, despite being one of the earliest to follow cricket in the trend of franchise-based tournaments, has not been able to put up a second edition after the first in 2011. IVL probably suffered for not being the sort of sophisticated television product the other events became.
“Not every league is going to survive,” says Blah. “It needs deep pockets; it needs committed owners and committed stake-holders at every level. You should be prepared to take losses.”
Kamlesh Mehta, a former national table tennis champion, is director at 11EVEN Sports, the promoters of a professional table tennis league scheduled for the summer of 2016 in India. He admits that there is an element of risk, but remains optimistic. “You have to have a sustainable model, obviously. The quality of players has to be up there. Most of these leagues have had to make changes to the format to make their sport TV-friendly. We have all of that in mind,” he says.
Talks with the Chinese Table Tennis Association have been positive and a dedicated window allotted by the International Table Tennis Federation in the calendar means that the world’s top players will be free to participate. “Of course you worry if you will succeed but that is there with any new challenge,” he says. “How will you know if you don’t even start?”
