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Indian captain Bhaichung Bhutia (left) with Edgar Davids during the Laureus Football Challenge held as part of the 2011 Laureus World Sports Awards in Abu Dhabi in January. (GETTY)
Taking inspiration from the successful Indian Premier League Twenty20 cricket, the Indian Football Association (IFA) is set to launch Premier League Soccer (PLS).
The Celebrity Management Group (CMG), has joined hands with the IFA to launch the PLS - an IPL-style franchise driven football tournament.
The PLS which will be held in January-March next year will initially have six franchises to be chosen through competitive bidding for 10 years with successful bidders paying a yearly franchise fee, according to reports in the Indian media.
Only limited companies with a minimum net worth of Rs10 crores could bid for a franchisee license.
The six franchise towns will be Kolkata, Howrah, Barasat, Asansol, Midnapore and Siliguri, IFA said in a release.
“Each team will have one icon player and three quality overseas layers. The icon players will be an overseas player with great repute, preferably someone who has represented his country in International matches. Each team can sign a maximum of 25 players,” it said.
The team composition will have a maximum three overseas players, one overseas player of Asian origin; minimum five catchment players; minimum six players of U-21 years and maximum 10 from anywhere in India.
“The vision is to create a world class sports infrastructure across Bengal to raise the level of the sport,” the release said.
Each team will be headed by an overseas coach with FIFA/UEFA A License and with proven track record.
PLS will be working as an autonomous and professional body under the license of IFA and will be headed by its Board of Governors.
With names such as former Dutch World Cup star Edgar Davids and Japanese icon Junichi Inamoto doing the rounds, football’s own IPL will certainly not be short on star power. Among the coaches, Philippe Troussier, who has managed Japan, Nigeria and South Africa at the international stage, is ready to add his expertise to the project.
According to Bhaswar Goswami, executive director of the organising group, they already have eight interested parties willing to buy a franchisee.
“At the moment there are eight business houses interested in the project… It will only increase with time as it’s quite a lucrative business proposal. Entrepreneurs beyond Bengal are also interested,” told Kolkata’s ‘The Telegraph’ newspaper.
Asked whether proper infrastructure was in place in the districts, Goswami said: “We will look after that… From temporary floodlights to proper dressing rooms, everything will be taken care of.”
Franchisee bids will take place tentatively in July, but before that the organisers want to finalise the foreign player pool to attract prospective buyers.
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