IPL founder: I wanted Mick Jagger to save English cricket from The Hundred
Indian Premier League founder Lalit Modi has revealed that he earmarked Mick Jagger as a team owner in a new English cricket competition to replace The Hundred and T20 Blast.
Modi says he offered the England and Wales Cricket Board £2.3bn over 20 years to buy the summer window in which The Hundred operates – three times the amount previously reported.
As an arch-critic of the ECB’s 100-ball product, he wanted to replace it with a T20 competition featuring franchises owned by English brands and cricket-loving celebrities such as Rolling Stones frontman Jagger.
“I made a $1bn bid, saying I want to buy the window. In that window, I said, we will launch an IPL style T20 with 10 teams,” Modi told the Unofficial Partner podcast.
“We will give you the money, which you should give 90 per cent to the counties. I said ‘I’ll give you $1bn over 10 years, another $2bn over the next 10 years’ – actually it was a $3bn deal, but it was for the window.”
Hampshire last week announced their sale to GMR Group, owner of the Delhi Capitals, while other IPL owners are known to be sniffing around the county game.
Indian investment is expected to flood into English cricket as part of the ECB’s auction of stakes in Hundred franchises, but Modi believes it will be short-lived.
“[IPL team owners] will come here for a summer holidays, they’ll attend a few games, but are they going to invest marketing dollars in this market? It’s wishful thinking,” he added.
“You need to bring in English owners, the top English companies. You need to bring in top English stars to own teams, fans of the game. Let me take an example of Mick Jagger. Great cricket fan. Why shouldn’t Mick own a team?”
Modi also doubled down on his trashing of ECB valuations of Hundred franchises, which he likened to “a ponzi scheme”, insisting it is “a non-starter”.
“I was never a bidder for a Hundred [franchise] because I don’t believe in the Hundred,” he said. “We will be sitting here two years from now, I’ll tell you it’s a non-starter. Even if IPL owners buy a team, they will walk away when there’s no return on it.”