About Lanka Premier League
The 2020 Lanka Premier League is also known by various other names. Most commonly it is known as Lanka Premier League. This league is one of the popular domestic professional cricket leagues organized in Sri Lanka. Not only in Sri Lanka, but this league is popular among all the different cricket-loving countries of the world. It is also known as M11 Circle Lanka Premier League T20 because M11 Circle was the major sponsor for this tournament. Last year in 2020, due to COVID-19 pandemic Lanka Premier League was cancelled by the management. But later on, the management decided to organize the first edition of M11 Circle Lanka Premier League. After following all the guidelines to prevent COVID-19, Lanka Premier League was held in November last year. It was the inaugural season for the Lanka Premier League, which is one of the top professional domestic cricket leagues in Sri Lanka. Before playing the inaugural match, an opening ceremony or inaugural ceremony was held for the opening of the tournament.
Foundation, Format & Teams
Sri Lanka Cricket or SLC is the official administrator of the Lanka Premier League. After the successful domestic but professional twenty20 leagues held all over the world, the Sri Lanka Cricket board decided to start a merchandise based cricket league in Sri Lanka too. We all know that there is a huge popularity of twenty20 cricket in the world. All the major cricket-loving countries are organizing their cricket leagues or franchise-based cricket leagues. These leagues like Indian Premier League, Big Bash League, Super Smash League, etc are generating a good source of income for the teams as well as players and organizers. All the cricket boards are taking these tournaments seriously. Considering all these factors, Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) announced the launch of a new T20 professional domestic cricket tournament in the country in 2019. The year 2020 was the first year or first season of this tournament. Around five teams were participating in this tournament and all of them were representing different cities or states of the country. A total number of 23 matches were played in the inaugural season of this tournament. In the inaugural season, Jaffna Stallions won the champion title by 53 runs. The runner team of the final match was Galle Gladiators. The format of this tournament is Twenty20 as usually other cricket tournaments have these days. The playing terms, conditions and rules of this tournament are based upon Round-Robin and Knockout rounds.
Sponsors
M11 Circle is the first and the major title sponsor for the LPL T20. Lanka Premier League’s first and inaugural season was held in 2020. The M11 Circle bought the title sponsorship of this tournament from the Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) at a huge amount of money. A total of Rs 150M was the bid price for the title sponsorship. For your information, M11 Circle is an Indian fantasy gaming platform which also sponsored many other cricket leagues out there in the world.
Top Teams & Players
As it was the first and inaugural season held of this tournament last year, it is hard to say which team is the best. However, if we look at the title winner, then Jaffna Stallions is the champion team and current titleholder. The runner up team was Galle Gladiators. Total five teams were participants and we can say that these two teams were the top-performing teams of this tournament. Danushka Gunathilaka of Galle Gladiators is the top-scoring batsman of this tournament. He has scored more than 470 runs in the inaugural season of this tournament. On the other side, the player of the series was Wanindu Hasaranga of Jaffna Stallions. He has taken a total of 17 wickets in the tournament and also he is the top wicket-taking player of this tournament.
Venues & Broadcasting
The inaugural season of this tournament was played in only a single stadium. Because there were restrictions on organizing cricket matches or gathering a large number of people in the stadium, the matches were limited to the one stadium only. MRIC stadium was the only venue in the inaugural season of this tournament. From the last week of November to December, there were a total of 23 matches played and all of these matches were broadcasted via various TV networks and internet all around the world. Audiences from all over Asia and the rest parts of the world showed love for this cricket tournament.
