IPL Retentions - Part 4 - Bonus Substack

Successfully starting one of the new franchises

In the final part of this IPL retention and market dynamics series, I want to take a look at how I’d approach running one of the new franchises. Just as a reminder, here’s the links for the previous parts of the series:-

Part 1 - An overview of the retention marketplace

Part 2 - Punjab Kings, Sunrisers Hyderabad, Rajasthan Royals & Royal Challengers Bangalore

Part 3 - Chennai Super Kings, Delhi Capitals, Kolkata Knight Riders & Mumbai Indians

**Many thanks to supporters who have bought me a coffee. It is much appreciated!**

To start off, I want to quickly run through the pre-auction dynamics for the two new teams, based in Ahmedabad and Lucknow. While the previously existing teams were allowed to retain four players, the two new teams can only take three players in advance of the auction. Not only this, but in theory at least, the top 20 or players are already unavailable to them having already been retained by the eight existing teams. To me, there’s little doubt that the two new teams are starting at a significant disadvantage based on this.

Having said this, if two new teams are run well, they have the chance to gain an immediate competitive advantage, because the auction is still extremely inefficient from a game theory perspective. If you want to understand why, I talk about it a bit in part 1 - linked above.

In my mind, the first hire which the owners need to focus on is a Director of Cricket. Not any DoC, but someone who is capable of creating a data-driven culture - to me, this is an absolute non-negotiable given the direction which the game is travelling in. That travel, currently, is pretty slow, but again it shows the competitive advantages which a new team can have if they are one of the early adopters of data to drive their processes.

Of course, every team has an analyst, and sometimes multiple analysts, but do they have recruitment analysts? How much are the analysts actually listened to? What impact do they have on recruitment, retention and selection? Based on my experience, most teams could dramatically improve in this respect.

Now I want to go back to the culture which the DoC needs to create. This is critical because new teams need to compete with teams with existing cultures and who have key players at the franchise who have been there for numerous years. Cultures don’t get built overnight, and it’s important to be aware that success can take time. It’s down to the DoC to hire people who ‘get it’. It might well be that they have to eventually adopt the Brendon McCullum quote ‘if you can’t change a man, change the man’, but ideally, they should be doing everything possible to hire the person who doesn’t need changing.

As an analyst, I can say with first-hand experience that you don’t always get the opportunity/power to fully implement your vision but this is why the DoC is the critical first appointment that a new franchise can make - because the entire team will be shaped by their vision. They should be the key person at the franchise who determines the style of play, the brand of cricket the team should adopt, and then they hire a head coach who shares those beliefs - you can’t hire a coach who has to change their beliefs to fit into the organisation.

You’d be amazed at how many teams across various sports do the opposite of this, and give far too much power to the head coach. It wouldn’t amaze me at all if the head coach at the two new teams ends up being the first appointment, and that’s a big mistake. Most IPL coaches don’t last that long, and then the team’s new coach has to join a team with a squad which may not be anything close to resembling their own vision, but then their hands are tied because it’s tough to press the reset button at a mini auction. This is why there has to be a coherent vision and style of play adopted from the DoC and then a head coach is subsequently recruited who has a similar mindset.

If I was DoC for one of the new teams, I’d be looking to implement my clear beliefs and methodologies about how a cricket team should be run. While I’m always looking to develop these things, and am open to challenges and refinement of them, I’m also strongly convinced by them. I’d want to create a franchise which prides itself in attacking, positive cricket with no fear, and creating a team which everyone wants to watch. The team which people would pay to watch. Would I pay to watch some of the IPL teams, in recent years? Probably not - the recruitment performed by some teams has been poor and the style of play has been mediocre at best. If you can create a team who regularly take the positive option in matches, and is successful, then the branding and commercial aspects take care of themselves. On that subject, it’s always worth reinforcing the point that any player recruited for ‘commercial reasons’ probably doesn’t improve a team’s expected points per game figure.

From a recruitment perspective, regular readers of my work won’t be surprised to read that the first key aspect is to recruit a squad capable of winning the boundary percentage count in matches on a regular basis. Whether that’s boundary-hitting with the bat, or boundary prevention with the ball, this is absolutely mandatory. This means that you shouldn’t spend big money on players who are below average boundary-hitters for example. It genuinely wouldn’t surprise me if one of the new teams took Shreyas Iyer, for example, for big money, but based on the key drivers for success in T20 leagues, this would be a huge mistake in my opinion.

Another mistake that a new team may make is valuing a player on reputation - be that from days long gone by, or from other formats. As a recruitment analyst, I genuinely couldn’t care less about reputation. A blend of youth and unlikely to decline experience is more vital, and with youth in particular, a focus has to be on developing future stars because the auction system won’t be around forever. I’m very big on giving young players opportunity, which has the potential to positively convert to future cost-effective loyalty.

Having discussed the DoC/head coach dynamic, and several of the mistakes that I anticipate the new franchises may make, I want to finish by moving on to some of the other areas where the new teams need to ensure they don’t make mistakes. Some of these are fairly idealistic, but if they are not adhered to then could negatively impact the chances of success for the new teams.

** Hire a data-driven specialist recruitment analyst to work at the auction. It all ties in with the above. Find someone who gives you the best chance of outperforming other teams at auction. For example, I create an expected performance model for players in drafts and auctions based on their performances around the world, with various weightings assigned. It’s a shameless plug for my services, but it’s an absolutely relevant consideration. A data-driven recruitment analyst is probably the hire which will give you the highest ROI in terms of cost compared to expected points per game gain.

** Don’t pay a premium for a captain, or pick a non-elite player in advance of the auction just to be a captain. In my view, most captains aren’t geniuses. MS Dhoni is the exception to the rule. Eoin Morgan has shown the value of a captain who has an open mind to data-driven decision making. Simply find someone who can do just that, but ideally from the domestic player pool - overseas captains generally aren’t a great idea due to them having to be absolutely elite level to be guaranteed a place in the starting XI.

** Ensure there is no owner interference. It’s not necessarily easy, but it’s a key element towards being successful. Owners should hire experts to do the jobs they are hired for, and simply just watch the outcomes.

** Don’t listen to agents when it comes to valuing players. I know a lot of agents, as it’s a critical relationship that a recruitment analyst needs to have. Most of them are good people, but they have a tendency to, shall we say, ‘talk up’ their own players. Make sure that you do your own due diligence and don’t rely on opinion/videos from agents. It’s basic but it would probably surprise people that on occasion, players are recruited largely from the recommendations of agents.

** Don’t assume a high profile ex-player knows everything. Many haven’t even played T20 to any degree, and just as relevantly, not in the last five years - a time period where the format has markedly evolved. As Norwich City DoF Stuart Webber once said words to the effect of - if Max Verstappen retired from F1 tomorrow, would you make him team principal? Of course you wouldn’t. So why do cricket (and also football) teams assume that just because you have 50+ caps for your country in a different format back in the day that you are the best fit to be a head coach or to recruit a team?

** Don’t let recency bias and the ‘eye test’ get in the way of making evidence-based decisions. We know that the World Cup has just taken place, so has the T10, and the Big Bash is starting soon. All of these high profile events are taking place in the preceding months before the mega auction. So too will big series, such as The Ashes be taking place in other formats. It’s important not to over value recent performances and instead, to ensure they are not outliers in a player’s longer-term performance levels.

** Understand that some leagues have less exposure than others. For example, I firmly believe that English players - particularly batters but also some bowlers - are undervalued on the world stage because the T20 Blast isn’t on TV much due to the structure of the event. I anticipate this situation for English players to eventually improve, due to The Hundred, but the value is still there for English players over, say, Australian players who participate in an extremely well-marketed home T20 competition, the Big Bash, and also have the additional benefit of there being a number of Australian coaches at the IPL.

** Make sure you know what drives success in the IPL. If just over 85% of teams in recent years win matches when they win the boundary percentage count in a match, and it’s pretty much impossible not to qualify with a positive net boundary percentage of much over 1% throughout the tournament, does it make sense to spend 10+ Crore on an anchor batter? Of course it doesn’t. So understanding these key drivers is vital to dictate recruitment policy.

Those are simply some of the considerations which the new teams have to take into account when structuring up ahead of the new season. There’s plenty more besides, but this is getting long and I have to keep some stuff for myself in case I get one of these jobs at some stage! I do hope you enjoyed this four-part mini-series on the IPL retention and marketplace, and I’ll return over the next couple of days to do a short personal take on my experiences at the T10 League.

**Many thanks to supporters who have bought me a coffee. It is much appreciated!**