CHENNAI: There’s a new league in town but it’s probably not the sport that you were expecting. After IPL-style leagues in football, kabaddi, table tennis, hockey, wrestling and badminton, kho kho is set to get one too with Ultimate Kho Kho set to be launched.
The league is set to be launched either in November or early next year. “We are in advanced talks with broadcasters, so that is likely to be tied up soon,” said the league’s CEO Tenzing Niyogi.
The league, which is being held in association with the Kho Kho Federation of India, will be held across two cities in its inaugural season. Eight teams will contest 60 matches. “One of the cities is likely to be Pune while the other will be one of Bengaluru or Hyderabad,” Niyogi said. “We have already had interest from Bollywood actors looking to own teams as well as from film personalities from the south. We have also received queries from various conglomerates, many of whom were waiting for a league in this sport to be launched.”
Ultimate Kho Kho will look to emulate the success of the Pro Kabaddi League, which unlike its football and badminton counterparts, did not require franchise owners to make a significant investment on players as most of them were domestic. Indeed, the promise of a comparatively cheap operating cost is one of the USPs of the league. “We expect the operational cost for a franchise to be almost 40 per cent of that of the PKL,” said Niyogi.
He added that the Kho Kho Federation of India had already shortlisted around 200 players, who will now be graded into three categories according to their performances in their last five national championships. This will help the teams to draft them into their roster. But that is not to say that the league will be an all Indian affair. There will be two international players in every 15-member squads. “Not many people know this but Kho Kho is played in multiple countries including the UK, South Korea, Sri Lanka, and South Africa,” said Niyogi. “We are looking to get players from these countries to participate. This will also help the game grow globally. We are aiming to host a World Championship in around eight years.”
The rules of the game has also been tweaked to make it more television friendly. The original nine minutes of play in each of the four rounds have been reduced to seven, which reduces the overall duration of the match to 28 minutes. Also introduced is the concept of a ‘wazir’, a player who is free to run either left or right, unlike other players. The organisers have also borrowed from cricket’s playbook and introduced a review system.