The SA20 is regarded as one of the best T20 competitions in the world. Picture: Shaun Roy / Sportzpics for SA20 There is no question the SA20 is a roaring success. It begs the question then, that with the competition getting bigger and bigger, which it clearly is, when will the time come that the owners and organisers consider adding another team to the mix?
As things stand, the SA20 has six sides in action, based in Pretoria, Johannesburg, Durban, Gqeberha, Paarl and Cape Town. They all have links to franchises based in India and the Indian Premier League. Is there an opportunity though for the competition to expand to seven teams, or more?
If the SA20 continues to grow I wouldn’t be surprised if there were a few big business men or women out there, perhaps in India, keen to get in on the action. After all, the IPL, the first real money-spinner when it’s come to T20 competitions, has seen changes over the year. When it started in 2008 it comprised eight city-based franchise teams.
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It now consists of 10 teams; some have been there from day one, such as Delhi Capitals, Chennai Super Kings and Mumbai Indians, while others have got spots and then vanished, such as Deccan Chargers and Gujarat Lions, to name two, and there have been a few new teams, too, who’ve joined the action more recently, like Sunrisers Hyderabad. Just last week SA20 announced the league had recorded the greatest number of sold-out matches in the first half of the competition since its inception. Also, organisers said there had been a 22% increase in ticket sales across the first 15 matches from season 3.
Television viewership numbers are apparently also up from previous seasons. On SuperSport, season 4’s opening fixture delivered a larger local linear audience than other major T20 leagues, outperforming the most recent IPL opening fixture by 59% and the Big Bash League in Australia by 118%. Streaming platforms and online engagement have also seen increases.
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