Hundred: Sale of franchise stakes could value cricket league at £700m
English cricket is set for a major financial boost with the Hundred sale, which enters its final round of bidding, expected to value the eight franchises at as much as £700m.
That figure is double the sum the England and Wales Cricket Board rejected from Bridgepoint for the whole tournament in 2022 and would therefore be a huge vindication of its approach.
The two capital franchises, London Spirit and Oval Invincibles, are the most sought-after and set to be valued at well over £100m each, sources close to the auction said.
The sell-off of the ECB’s 49 per cent stakes in the teams has drawn interest from both Indian Premier League owners and serial sport investors from the United States.
Global Hundred bidders
India’s richest family, the Ambanis, is in for the Oval Invincibles Hundred franchise but face competition from CVC Capital Partners and a Silicon Valley consortium led by former SoftBank executive Nikesh Arora.
London Spirit will be the first team auctioned on Thursday, with the remaining franchises sold over the coming days. An announcement of the winning bidders is expected next week.
A group including Chelsea co-owner Todd Boehly, members of the Glazer family who own Manchester United and the Silicon Valley consortium are all keen on the London Spirit Hundred franchise.
The owner of IPL team Lucknow Super Giants, RPSG Group, is believed to have shown interest in all eight teams. Investors are only permitted to buy stakes in one franchise.
The Sun Group, which owns Sunrisers Hyderabad in the IPL, is understood to be in for Durham-based Hundred franchise Northern Superchargers but retain an interest in another team.
Money raised from the sale of the ECB’s stakes is set to be redistributed among the domestic game. Host counties can then decide whether to sell their 51 per cent stakes or not.
“Our target was to raise £350m from sales,” ECB chair Richard Thompson told City PM in November. “I think we’re going to exceed that comfortably, but we’ve still got some way to go.”
Counties have already been asked to nominate multiple preferred Hundred bidders for the final stage of the auction, which is being run by the ECB and US merchant bank the Raine Group.
Once the winning bids have been decided, counties and bidders will enter an exclusivity agreement with a view to finalising the sales before the summer.