Suspension of Vivo's ties with IPL a blip not financial crisis: Sourav Ganguly

Tags: IPL, Sourav Chandidas Ganguly, Vivo

Published on: Aug 10, 2020

Reacting to the BCCI's decision to suspend the Indian Premier League’s title sponsorship deal with Chinese mobile maker Vivo, the Indian cricketing body's President Sourav Ganguly termed it a 'blip' and not a 'financial crisis'.

Although BCCI had announced Vivo as the title sponsor for IPL 2020, the Chinese company pulled out of this year's event in the wake of massive backlash owing to the Galwan Valley clash. The 2020 edition will be held in the UAE from September 19.

At a webinar that was organised by educational book publishers S Chand Group, Ganguly stated, “I wouldn’t call it as a financial crisis. It’s just a little bit of a blip.”

Assuring that the cricket board has a 'Plan B' in place, Ganguly went on to add, “BCCI, it’s a very a strong foundation – the game, the players, the administrators in the past have made this game so strong that BCCI is able to handle all these blips. You keep your other options open. It is like Plan A and Plan B. Sensible people do it. Sensible brands do it. Sensible corporates do it."

“And the only way you can do it is by being professionally strong over a period of time. Big things don’t come overnight. And big things don’t go away overnight. Your preparation for a long period of time gets (you) ready for losses, gets you ready for successes," the former Indian captain went on to add.

It may be noted that Vivo won the IPL sponsorship rights for five years from 2018 to 2022 for a sum of reportedly Rs 2,190 crore.

Further, speaking about ICC's decision to allow India to keep their 2021 World Cup hosting rights, Ganguly explained, "India was designated (to host) the 2021 and 2023 World Cups so there is not a big change in that. Yes, the COVID situation had kept everybody alarmed, but that’s the way it is."

--By A Cricket Correspondent

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