MUMBAI: The stage is set for the fourth edition of the Hero Indian Super League to kick off Friday evening. Featuring two new teams and a five-month season involving 95 games running through to next March, the ISL has now partially answered one major negative it carried since its inception in 2014 – that it had a too short run time.
That is not all. All the 95 matches have been slotted at the 8 pm prime time slot, with games played only on weekends.
Kolkata’s ATK, the defending champions, will kick off the proceedings in Kochi when they take on Kerala Blasters at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium.
On the revenues front, meanwhile, ISL is expected to generate Rs4 billion in advertising, sponsorships and gate receipts this year, a 25% jump over last year, Mint reports.
The league’s three main sponsors have all renewed their deals. The country’s largest two-wheeler maker, Hero MotoCorp, continues as title sponsor while both Maruti Suzuki and DHL continue as associate sponsors.
As for the two new teams in the expanded league, both the TATA Group-backed Jamshedpur FC and the JSW Steel owned Bengaluru FC have the requisite pedigree to ensure that they will more than just make up the numbers.
That applies even more so to Bengaluru FC, twice I-league champions in the three years they competed in India’s second tier club competition, before making the move up into the ISL.
As the focus has now shifted to nurturing home-grown players, this year the league has done away with the requirement of a marquee player and has ensured the foreign player limit has been restricted to eight with just five allowed on the field at any given point.
The time is now for India’s established and upcoming stars to make their mark.
