Manchester United owners show interest in buying IPL franchise, says report

Popular football club Manchester United's owners – the Glazer family have reportedly shown interest in buying a new team in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2022 tournament.

According to a report, the Glazer family has selected the Invitation to Tender (ITT) document from the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) through a private equity company. The invite states the procurement of the two new teams for the upcoming season.

“A lot of people usually pick these tender documents to study and gather the information that tends to be otherwise very useful from a larger industry perspective. For instance, buying a bid document will tell me more about what the BCCI is planning next, in terms of the league expansion, etc. For instance, if Disney has bought the tender document to buy the franchise, it doesn't mean Disney is interested in owning a franchise. It will study the document because it has to plan its own media rights landscape,” asserted the ones tracking developments to TOI.

Reports also suggest that the bidders for the upcoming IPL are expected to submit an average turnover of Rs 3,000 crore or a net worth of Rs 2,500 crore. Bidders who fulfill these criteria will only be eligible to bid in the league.

For the unversed, the foreign companies are allowed by the BCCI to submit the bid and buy the ITT. This means, Manchester United can own a team, however, they will have to set up a company in India if they are successful in the bid. So far, there is no official confirmation as to whether the US-based Glazers will make a formal bid to own a franchise.

Other than Manchester United, the Glazers family is also part of the US-based National Football League (NFL) as they own the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

Apart from the Glazers family, the others who have also picked up the invite are Aurobindo Pharma, RP-Sanjiv Goenka Group, Adani Group, Torrent Pharma, entrepreneur Ronnie Screwvala, Hindustan Times Media, Jindal Steel (led by Naveen Jindal), and three other private equity players.

Furthermore, the deadline to purchase the ITT document was 20 October, while the teams are said to bid submissions on 25 October.