Auction of IPL 2019 to Be Given a Prime Time Treatment

The 2019 Indian Premier League (IPL) is going to be for the 12th edition of the tournament. The auction of the tournament is scheduled to take place on December 18 in Jaipur.

This time the star-studded occasion will see only 70 players go under hammer. The teams have only 50 Indian and 20 overseas players to pick from the lot.

As the date of the auction has fallen on a weekday, the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has decided to start the auction from 3 PM IST. In the previous years the auctions always started from 10 AM in the morning.

Earlier this month, all the franchises have submitted the list of their retained and released players. Since then the fans are eagerly waiting for the auctions to take place and the mega event will be held in just three week time.

Reports from Mumbai Mirror suggest that BCCI has suggested to hold the event in the afternoon to get more viewership as the day being a weekday.

The auction will be a day-night event as it will begin from 3PM and go on until 9:30 PM in the night. This also brings good news for the cricket enthusiasts of India.

This is because December 18 is the last day of the second Test between India and Australia. By 3 PM in the country, the action of the Test match will definitely end before the auction begins. This means the cricket fans will not get caught between watching India’s game and the auction.

“It does not make sense to have the auction running parallel to the Test match which has potential to go down the wire and produce a thrilling finish,” a source close to the proceedings said.