Pro-Kabaddi is all set to begin its seventh season from July 20th and has been the most successful non-cricketing domestic league. No doubt PKL was the revival platform for a homegrown game since its introduction and is now the second most viewed league in India after IPL.
But apart from PKL, many domestic properties like ISL, Premier Badminton League, Hockey India league or the TT Ultimate championship haven’t seen the same response from the audience. So what exactly is the reason behind such perplexed results?
Is it the presentation of the tournament? Or the target audience or just the lack of big names? Sponsors or promotion?
In a long saturated time will sports leagues decide the popularity and participation of young emerging talents?
Very Simple. You can get the result very quickly. 20 min each and two halves and just a gap of 5 min in between the halves. Above all of these, the excitement, tension and what not. Everything u get in one hour. I think these are the reasons
Prime reason may be that everybody understands the sport!
One reason of Relative low popularity of Football and Hockey leagues may be that not everybody understands off sides, fouls etc. Another thing is that in Kabaddi like cricket something is happening constantly. Not just far and few goals in a long game.
When talking about Football, It enjoys wide fan base in India but Indian football fan is lured away by European leagues as quality of Indian football is not up to the mark compared to them.
The prime reason which I see for the rise of Kabaddi becoming one of the most popular sports in India is:
1.The Sports was already very famous in India, I mean almost everyone must have played kabaddi once in their lifetime if you are from a tier 2 city or below.
2. The rules are very simple, nothing not a single complicated rules.
3. Star media promoted it wonderfully. Normal stars like anup kumar, rakesh kumar, rahul chaudhari etc etc became household names. Also the changes Marshall sports which they brought in sports such as super tackle and do and die raid changed the game for good.
4. India had total control and domination in sports. So they asked all the stars of the world to join the league. And most of the world stars were desi so a feeling of ‘apnapan’ arised in Indians.
5. The timing of 8 pm, which is the primetime was selected to telecast the league which was a masterstroke. Plus the fast nature of game and just the 40 mins duration was one the best thing which suited Indians.
6. The players should also get the credit. They played their hearts out. Rahul chaudhari, sandeep narwhal, pradeep narwal, manjeet chillar etc etc were stars that were born out of pkl. Also foreigners like fazel attrachali also caught the complete attention of the World.
