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English cricket’s governing body expects broadcasting revenue for its The Hundred short-form tournament to treble by 2032 as it kicks off an auction for stakes in the eight participating teams.
The England and Wales Cricket Board, which set up The Hundred in 2021, hopes to raise up to £500mn from selling a 49 per cent stake in each of the teams, which include London Spirit, the Oval Invincibles and Welsh Fire.
Proceeds will be distributed across English cricket’s county teams to help them pay off debt and invest in new sources of revenue. Some money will also go to promote the grassroots game.
The remaining 51 per cent stake in each team will be transferred to the home venues of each team, who will then be free to sell part or all of their stake to investors.
According to an investment presentation seen by the Financial Times, the ECB expects TV revenue for The Hundred to rise from the current £40mn a year to £120mn by 2032. Half of that increase is forecast to come from international rights, which are currently worth about £2mn a year.
The ECB believes the UK timezone can give The Hundred an advantage in reaching a global audience, allowing it to build on domestic media rights deals with Sky and the BBC.
The investment presentation, put together by the ECB and its financial advisers Raine Group and Deloitte, also forecasts rapid growth in sponsorship revenue, from £9mn this year to more than £80mn in 2032.
In a statement announcing the start of the process on Friday, the ECB’s director of business operations Vikram Banerjee said the auction was “the most significant private investment opportunity in the history of cricket in our country”, and had already generated a “phenomenal level of interest from a diverse mix of investors globally”.
More than 100 investors will receive the presentation, according to people familiar with the details, including team owners in the Indian Premier League, sovereign wealth funds, specialist sports investors and owners of US sports teams.
The Hundred format — where each team plays 100 balls — is not played anywhere else in the world. It was created to help attract a new audience to cricket with a short, fast-paced version of the game. Matches are played two at a time, with the women’s sides competing before the men. The ECB says that more than a third of attendees at The Hundred matches are women, compared with less than 10 per cent for a typical men’s international game.
However, critics of the tournament say it has diverted money and attention away from globally popular international test cricket and added to the already overcrowded match calendar.
Those complaints grew louder when England men’s captain Ben Stokes tore his hamstring while playing for the Northern Superchargers in The Hundred last month, ruling him out of a test series against Sri Lanka.
Some analysts have attached a lower valuation to The Hundred teams than the ECB estimate of up to £1bn. Oakwell Sports Advisory, which works with investors in the sector, believes the eight teams combined are worth £380mn-£500mn.
Bringing in outside investors is designed to give The Hundred the financial muscle to hire more of the best cricketers. The overall budget for men’s and women’s teams will rise to £2.6mn in 2025 from £1.5mn in 2023.
The Hundred is one of a growing list of short-form cricket competitions looking to emulate the success of the Indian Premier League, which now generates more than $1bn a year from its broadcasting rights. South Africa, Australia, Pakistan, the United Arab Emirates and the US are among those with rival T20 contests, where each side faces 20 six-ball overs.
However, the long-term prospects of these tournaments are likely to hinge on whether Indian players — who are generally restricted from playing in T20 tournaments outside India — are given permission by the country’s governing body to participate. The inclusion of top Indian cricketers is seen as key to expanding audiences and broadcasting revenues.
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