Contrary to media speculation that a 500 player auctionwill take place this July for IPL season 4, the league's chairman andcommissioner lalit Modi told sportzpower that the auction will takeplace in October, 2010. For Modi, the priority now is to first rollout the tender process and complete the bidding before IPL season 3begins on March 12. This way, the process of identifying the teamswill be completed well before the tournament kick starts and this willallow the new franchise owners to get a feel of managing teams in realtime during the 45 day long season.
An IPL Governing Council meeting is scheduled soon, according to Modi,which in turn will take up a detailed agenda on the bidding documentfor the team tenders, as also the number of players thsat can beretained by each franchise, cap on number of foreign players, cap onnumber of matches to be played by each team among other issues.Powerful franchise owners will also have an important say in thedeciding on these sensitive issues. For one they reckon they havinvested heavily in the 'icon' and some foreign players over the lastthree years and they wouldn't want to part with them.
More importantly, given that the number of matches will increase from60 to 94 since 10 teams will be in the fray, teams will have to avoidplayer burn out. As the recent controversy over induction of Pakistaniplayers in season 3 has shown, the franchise owners are quick to closeranks against any interloper. This unity while taking a crucialdecision has shown once again that the franchise owners and Modi aresteadfast in proetcting their commercial interests.
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