New owners for Jaffna franchise in LPL

by Rex Clementine

The winners of the inaugural Lanka Premier League – Jaffna Stallions have been shown the door after ‘breach of contract’ according to Sri Lanka Cricket and the ownership of the franchise has changed hands to UK based businessman Allirajah Subaskaran.

Subaskaran, who owns one of Britain’s leading mobile phone companies – Lyca is of Sri Lankan origin. With his take over, Jaffna will have a single owner and will be known as Jaffna Kings.

The previous owners of the franchise had about ten directors; all Sri Lankans living across the world.

Jaffna Stallions was the best organized franchise in the tournament and there was little surprise as they stormed to victory amidst much fanfare last year. They were brilliantly led by Thisara Perera and fans were able to see a whole lot of new stars during the month long competition.

Jaffna Stallions in a tweet said that they tried ‘everything to make it work’ and that they were going to put out a statement regarding the situation. The statement, however, did not come out even when this edition went to print.

The Island learns that contracts of several other franchises too have been terminated for not honouring their contracts. The reason for termination seems failure to make payments. Jaffna Stallions, however, had not defaulted payments and there were other issues pertaining to them being overlooked, it is learned.

The termination had been done by Dubai based IPG group and not Sri Lanka Cricket. SLC has sold the rights of the competition to IPG.

Sources also said that the original Jaffna team that had some very good signings from overseas will not be dismantled and the new owners will be allowed to continue with the same team. Thisara Perera is expected to be retained as captain.

SLC was confident that the tournament will continue as planned despite the setback of losing original franchise owners.

The second edition of the LPL will get underway in December with the first leg of the tournament being played in Colombo in a bio-secure bubble and the second leg moving to Hambantota. The southern city hosted the entire tournament last year.

The authorities are looking at the possibility of accommodating small number of fans for the games, The Island learns.