Indian Premier League (IPL) and its possible Impact on Indian Sports BCCI’s IPL is all set to emerge as the biggest domestic sports event in India. With the inception of IPL, Indian sports are entering into a new era of professional sports. Few months back it was Force India, F1 team of UB Group made all the headlines for the right reasons and that truly signifies the confidence of Indian market, and thus global acquisition in sports is also going to be a new trend. Hopefully by 2010 India would go through many such initiatives, and possibly by that time India would set the foundations for many sports properties to emerge in the Indian market. The present set up of Indian sports is ideal for cricket to capture the market further, and consolidate its position due to the absence of a real competitor. No doubt that Indian sports economy is cricket centric at present but definitely set to change in few years time. The careful study of IPL points out that it is modeled around American Sports and not anything close to English Premier League. In terms of marketing and merchandising IPL may have adopted an English Premier League model. But for all that we have to wait and see how IPL delivers in its inaugural season, and competes with other growing international sports properties. With the advent of IPL Indian sports market is set to change and probability of emerging new professional sports properties are all time high. The potential of Indian sports market is very high and still in its infancy stage. The emergence of increased number of professional sports management firms and growing interest of International sports properties towards Indian market are also something new to Indian market. All the recent developments are likely to trigger massive change in the set-up of Indian sports. The biggest question is that, is IPL good or bad for football? Definitely the advent of IPL is good for Indian sports and football may benefit out of new confidence of domestic sports scenario in India. In other words IPL is not directly going to benefit football but IPL is going to create a new sporting culture in India. The new professional sports culture would benefit the beautiful game and who knows IPL franchisees may adopt football teams as well in the near future or in the long run. There is a strong possibility of that to happen because IPL in its present format would last for 56 days (as per release) and what these franchisees should do for the next 8 to 10 months. Sports franchisee cannot exist in sports business if they limit their activities for two months and in order to maximize their business investment these franchisees may have to diversify their activities, and football looks to be a strong option at present. Look who all have brought the franchisees of Indian Premier League (IPL) floated by Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) that went to auction on 24th January 2008? The list of team owners are packed with corporate tycoons and bollywood icons. It is a reality that few of the franchisee owners have strong passion for football and possibility of them investing in football looks brighter after their entry into professional sports through IPL. We also have to understand that there are few corporate tycoons and bollywood stars who failed in their attempt to buy out the franchisees in IPL, and for all of them and for many other corporate big wigs, football presents an unlimited opportunities for investment. Football is already attracting fresh investment from corporate, and football is all set to move forward aggressively in the coming years and birth of IPL has also given the opportunity to football, a competitor in the domestic sports arena. The emergence of a competitor is always good for the development of sports property and at present IPL, even before the event taking shape and place, IPL seems to be well ahead of football (I-league) but in the long run football will be seriously fighting for the top slot. It would have been difficult to predict the success of IPL if it was not for twenty-20. The success of Indian team at twenty-20 world cup and collection of International stars together with high profile owners, and record television deals, and not to forget the extensive media coverage and existence of a space for a professional domestic sports event to flourish, and above all the passion of Indian masses towards CRICKET makes it easier to predict the success of the event. Otherwise it would be always difficult to predict the success of such new sports property in any part of the world. There should not be any doubt in the minds of fans that football is not going to get the same backing from corporate and bollywood bigwigs in the times to come. It is paramount to understand that Indian sports market potential is very high and it can occupy several mega sports properties at one time. India with more than billion people has a definite space for multi-sport industry to thrive with mega sports properties including football. Indian football has a good club culture and if clubs are able to adopt the professional structure without much delay then the investment in football will flow at a significantly higher rate and that could well multiply the development. Few new clubs which got operational last year have come to the stage with full professional structure and that is going to definitely impact the game for the good. Overall football is going to gain with or without IPL and that what is important to understand.