Cricketainment

Cricketainment is the new word coined by media in the year 2008. It is a combination of 2 words to form a new word
that is Cricket + Entertainment = Cricketainment. The popularity of amalgamating the two already popular themes in India has evolved into cricketainment which is gaining record popularity.

History
The media coined this term in early 2008 in part due to the enormous hype concerning the upcoming inaugural Indian Premier League season. This tournament brings together for the first time the glamour of Bollywood with the fanatical following cricket enjoys in India. The average Twenty20 game lasts about three hours, as much as a typical Bollywood movie, and so is believed to attract a larger audience than Test and One Day International matches..

Introduction
Cricketainment is basically about providing entertainment along with sports. IPL T20 tournament was primarily responsible for this concept, though it should be noted that the format was originally invented by Zee Entertainment boss Subhash Chandra, who founded the Indian Cricket League (ICL). It is he who initially conceptualized the format based along the city or regional lines and made cricket clubs to promote regional talent. To rival the popularity of ICL, the nation's cricket governing body, the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), came up with IPL and took the concept a step further along the lines of the English Premier League or NBA clubs in US. The IPL is structured along the lines of professional leagues such as the English Premier League, complete with relegations and promotions. The league has recruited several prominent overseas cricketers and will have separate TV, internet, mobile, merchandising, sponsorship and ground signage rights. Then they auctioned the players and clubs into the open market and made it possible for wealthy individuals or organizations to purchase and promote the clubs that they would be owning in the future.
The individuals who bought the clubs in IPL T20 were famous movie stars or business tycoons who inturn roped in Bollywood or regional movies stars as ambassadors to add glamor and promote their respective clubs. Thus cricketainment was born where fans could see the bollywood stars mingling with the famous cricket stars. The game also introduced new things in cricket like cheer leading for respective clubs and star promo videos apart from promotional products like caps, T-shirts etc. for their clubs.

Impact
According to IPL chairman Lalit Modi IPL T20 is a marriage between two major entertainment properties Cricket and Bollywood, hence it defines cricketainment in its full glamor. There has been no holding back for the IPL T20 tournament as Shah Rukh Khan and Juhi Chawla bought a team and so did Preity Zinta with her boyfriend Ness Wadia. The big business houses of Vijay Mallya and Mukesh Ambani, media houses Deccan Chronicle and UK-based Emerging Media major corporations like India Cements and GMR also bought teams, and the tournament is sponsored by DLF.
The razzmatazz from Akshay Kumar and Daler Mehndi, shapely cheerleaders never seen on any cricket ground, an F1 car of Force India, big beat music, acrobats, stilt-dancers, laser shows and firecrackers amounted to a heady cocktail of cricket. The inaugural match held in the Chinnaswamy stadium in Bengaluru was a stunner in terms of both showmanship and sports performances. This was the modern version of the ancient Roman Circus, the top entertainment of people with gladiators and wild animals. Now the Roman saying, 'Give them bread, give them circus', has been replaced by a newer version, 'Give them chapati, give them cricket'.
So much has been the impact of IPL T20 Tournament that many television soaps slotted in the 8 pm to 11 pm time slots(prime time slot) have started getting considerably very low TRP ratings after the tournaments have started. Not only that but also the popular bollywood movies have started failing at the box office which tells the successful impact IPL T20 is having on the large audience.

With cricket already having a huge popularity in south asian countries this new form of entertainment is already gaining record heights. Given the short duration of the game even new countries would be willing to adopt this format and eventually it has the potential of becoming a industry in itself.

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