A lot of it has to do with people wishing something like it did work out. I think the cricket landscape wasn’t quite ready for it back then too since there weren’t much T20 franchise leagues then.
It aligns with a post I wanted to make here too… is there just too much T20 franchise cricket being played? I don’t mind having the odd T20 game to tune into but a few weeks ago the scenario was… BBL, SA20, ILT20 or the BPL. It’s just way too much to try to follow and just like cricket not having as many “big” names to have unique representation per league… I’m not sure they have enough people interested to follow those leagues properly in the long run. A few weeks from now and we’ll have the PSL starting… and then the IPL. The IPL is tolerable partly because it is the only T20 league on at that time.
Not sure if this is a sign of me becoming older or there just being too much cricket to follow for one person.
Champions League is one of those things that sounds like good idea because they have such things in other sports, but others sports don't have players playing for six or ten teams a year. The way cricket franchises operate is not practical, in my opinion.
Players playing for multiple teams which will likely end up at the richest one when it comes to who they play for.
Another factor is no other league can sign Indian players, so they have an advantage. What if Birmingham (Bears or Phoenix) were to lose Moeen to CSK in such a tournament, it's not like they could sign Kohli or Pandya, but CSK could (if Moeen chose to play for Birmingham) sign anyone to replace him.
I've never seen an example of 'well to counteract that, you could do this...' that would be feasible when some teams will always have an advantage.
You could do one featuring domestic teams (e.g county or state) where you would likely avoid it but not all nations have a non-franchise T20 tournament. Also, I doubt anyone would be that interested.
The other option, given how a small number of people have bought up so many teams would be a tournament featuring franchises (e.g. Knight Riders, Super Kings etc). But at that point it is just a tournament to see who is the best billionaire.
If the ICC had any good leadership or foresight, 'Champions League T20' SHOULD have been how T20 internationals are structured in some form (league system or different groups). That way they have some meaning beyond just a money-making scheme in between World Cups.
Beyond that, the IPL is essentially the Champions League of cricket because that's where you can see all the best players in the world.
www.espncricinfo.com
www.google.com
