Apparel Sponsorship History of IPL - From 2008 To 2018

Here is an update for the chart I posted previously, here.

Click for Enlarged Image

The 11th season of IPL that concluded recently saw no newcomers to the league of kitmakers. Zeven and Performax continued to manufacture apparel for RCB and MI respectively while T10 Sports added KXIP to their bouquet this year continuing their association with DD from last season.

Tyka, while continuing with SRH, signed a new deal with RR for manufacturing their kits. KKR still does not have an official jersey maker and Dhoni owned Seven brand now sponsors CSK.

Captains pose behind the IPL-11 trophy during a photoshoot 

The current league of kit manufacturers hasn't changed much from the previous season. Major international sportswear companies are still a no-show. Though this has enabled the Indian brands to cash in the opportunities in the cash-rich league, they have failed to capture the market because of greed. The jerseys and fanwear that are made available to the public for purchase are extremely overpriced for the quality being offered.

The global biggies like Adidas, Puma, Nike and New Balance would only be interested in IPL if the clothing regulations are reviewed. No big company would be willing to sponsor these teams unless they get their rightful slot on the jerseys that would promise visibility and recognition.

Prediction on RCB's 2018 Jerseys!

As I do every season, here is my prediction on the RCB jerseys for the 2018 season of the Indian Premier League! This prediction bases my previous post on the RCB's Brand House which itself is based on the branding for the stands taken from the stadium layout sourced from the ticketing portal.

As stated earlier, Zeven continues its association as the kit manufacturer for RCB and it is likely that the design from the last two seasons will remain unchanged. The illustration below depicts what the jerseys might look like in my opinion.

Potential RCB Jerseys for 2018

The front branding would either be Eros Now or HP. One of the two will have the spot on the right chest. There is also a possibility of these two brands switching places for home and away jerseys as shown in the illustration above.

According to my prediction, the following will be the slot-share for the associated brands.

• Front - Eros Now / HP
• Right Chest - Eros Now / HP
• Leading Arm Upper - Jio Telecom
• Non-Leading Arm Upper - Domino's Pizza
• Non-Leading Arm Lower - Duroflex Mattresses
• Back - Duraguard Cement

The RCB logo will be on the left chest; the VIVO IPL logo will have its mandatory lower leading arm spot. Apart from these, Zeven and 7UP will be seen on leading limb and non-leading limb of the trousers respectively.

'The Royal Attire' series will resume after the jerseys are officially unveiled! Stay tuned!

Disclaimer: None of these sponsors have been announced officially by the RCB. Please note that the article relies majorly on my guesswork and possibilities exist that would render all the above information false.

The RCB Brand House of 2018!

The tickets for RCB's home matches are on sale from this moment. (Click here and book right away!) However, the motto of this blog is not to serve as an advertising media and here I slip to the focus of the blog! As usual, the layout of the stands in the M Chinnaswamy Stadium is displayed in the ticketing portal and the stands have been named after the sponsors of RCB for this season. Have a look below.

Layout of M Chinnaswamy Stadium

The followings brands are associated with the stands in Chinnaswamy.
A Stand - Eros Now
B Upper - Jio
B Lower - Jio
C Upper (Grand Terrace) - HP
C Lower - Duraguard
D Corporate - Wrogn
E Executive - Duraguard
G Upper - Duroflex
G Lower - Dominos
M1 Stand - Dominos
M2 Stand - Jio
M3 Stand - Wrogn
M4 Stand - Duroflex
N Stand - Eros Now
P1 Annex - Eros Now
P1 Stand - Eros Now
P2 - Eros Now
P3 - Eros Now
P Terrace - HP
P Corporate - Duraguard

While Jio and Duroflex Mattresses have remained to be associated with RCB as well as the stands they are named after, there are a lot of newcomers to the house. With Eros Now and HP branding linked with the majority of the stands in the stadium, it is highly likely that one of these will end up as a principal sponsor and takes the prominent real estate on the front of RCB jersey with another going to the chest spot. Dominos is another new entrant which will most likely decorate the upper spot on the non-leading arm.

Duraguard Cement branding will don the back of RCB jerseys this season.

As reported earlier, Duraguard Cement will don the back of RCB jerseys and Wrogn will be seen on the players' headgear once again. Zeven continues its association with RCB as the official kit-maker. 7UP is also likely to remain in the RCB Brand House for 2018.

Stay tuned for BrandCricket Prediction for 2018 RCB jersey!

Disclaimer: None of these sponsors have been announced officially by the RCB. Please note that the article relies majorly on my guesswork and possibilities exist that would render all the above information false.

Daredevils unveil new kits for 2018

Delhi Daredevils have unveiled their new strips for the new season which actually lacks anything that's 'new'. The quality of the design has been declining season to season for DD and this year is not an exception. Starting the IPL in 2008 with one of the best attires, the GMR owned team has gradually minimized all its efforts on the visual aspects of the playing clothing leading to this season's (so far) pathetic jersey as seen below.

Players pose with the 2018 Delhi Daredevils jersey

Sports goods manufacturer Shiv-Naresh has probably ended its deal with DD and the current manufacturer for the playing kits is unknown as of now. The design is repetitive with no changes to the base of past few years' jerseys. The collar part is changed, making the jersey look poorer.

'Daikin' has continued its association with DD and their logo dons the central part of the jersey. 'Jio Telecom' also continues to sponsor DD in some capacity and the logo which is now changed to blue from last year's red, rests on the upper leading arm instead of last year's right chest while the IPL logo sits on the lower leading arm. The franchise owner GMR Holdings have decided to show off their own logo on the lower non-leading arm while the upper slot on the non-leading arm remains empty as of now.

New sponsor 'Suzuki Gixxer' has been awkwardly placed on the right chest while the newly simplified 'DD' logo of the team is placed on the usual left part of the chest. Another new sponsor, Cargill India's brand 'Nature Fresh' is prominently displayed on the back of the jersey.

Gautam Gambhir, the newly announced skipper of DD

Brand Cricket Verdict: The jersey could have been loads better in my opinion. Sticking to the same base design (though not being liked by many) is not a good approach. The oldest black and red jersey by Adidas still remains my favorite for DD. Cricket teams should basically root on symmetric jersey designs rather than asymmetric ones like this one.

Brand Cricket Jersey Score: 4 on 10

Stay tuned for more updates on all IPL jerseys for 2018.

Update (13th March 2018): The kit manufacturer is learnt to be T10 sports, the same company that made kits for Delhi Daredevils last year. Here is a tweet from the manufacturer.

Here comes the captain .! Back to home@DelhiDaredevils is all set to give his best in IPL 2018, and we Delhiites are the backbone of Daredevils Team.

Be the twelfth man of Delhi Daredevils team, Wear Official Player jersey with Your name, Available only at @t10sports #ipl2018 https://t.co/uA29IoiLCt

— T10 Sports (@t10sports) March 12, 2018

CSK's possible 'new' attire for 2018

CSK has returned to the IPL after two years and has 'retained'... yes, you guessed it! The jersey design. The most consistent element in the IPL so far are the batsman insignia in the IPL logo and CSK's jersey design. The yellow jersey which has been the same from since forever has returned with some new sponsors with the main one being 'The Muthoot Group' which has replaced Aircel's 8-year-long spot on the belly. The mock-up for the 'new' jersey has been posted by the twitter handle of 'Equitas Small Finance Bank' and it looks like this.

The above mock-up might not be completely true to what the final jersey would be; we might see a change in the design (which we hope every season) depending on what the CSK management decides.

With reference to this jersey shown, the following are the sponsors that claim the real estate on the clothing:

• The Muthoot Group (Belly)
• Gulf Oil (Right Chest)
• Equitas Small Finance Bank (Upper Leading Arm)
• Hyderabad Industries Limited (Upper Non-Leading Arm)
• Nippon Paints (Lower Non-Leading Arm)
• India Cements (Back)

If my assumption is correct, Spartan will be back to continue its association with CSK for manufacturing the official kits. M S Dhoni's own 'Seven' brand (which is supported by Spartan) might be labelled as the official kit supplier for CSK in 2018. 

Stay tuned for more updates on all IPL jerseys for 2018. Exclusive info on RCB jersey to follow soon!

Original Tweet:

Get ready to whistle! The fun has started again, this time with our very own @ChennaiIPL . We are happy to announce that Equitas Small Finance Bank is now the proud sponsor of Chennai Super Kings! Stay tuned to our page for more updates. #BackWithTheBank #Equitas #CSK pic.twitter.com/JtuZMHpwBI

— EquitasBank (@EquitasBank) January 26, 2018

Apparel Sponsorship History of IPL - The First Ten Years

This post will act as a supplement to the post I made earlier in May 2016. (Read it here!) I have made a better chart this time which you can see below.

Click for Enlarged Image

Everything about apparel sponsorships in the first nine seasons was explained in the article I have previously posted and I will be speaking only about the 10th season in this post. There were no major changes to the manufacturers' line up this year for the teams. RCB and MI continued their associations with Zeven and Performax respectively while Tyka reduced the number of teams it sponsored in the last season from 3 to 2 (KXIP and SRH) with GL signing a deal with Sasperil Greenlands (SG). DD also signed a new manufacturer - T10 Sports for making its kits.

Two teams did not have any official apparel sponsor in this season; KKR continued not to have a kitmaker while RPS did not continue with Seven, the brand owned by MS Dhoni.

Captains align behind the IPL-10 trophy and the Bats signed for MCC's Spirit Cricket Pledge at the Opening Ceremony

With a decade of IPL gone, new and exciting things await the fans from the 11th season taking place in 2018. I expect huge changes to take place in the next season with international players in the apparel industry making way once again into the IPL arena. With two suspended teams returning, it would be interesting to see what their brand-strategy would be for their return.

What changes in the branding and apparel would you like to see in the next season of IPL? Drop in your comments below!

The Tenth Year of the RCB's Jersey! (Episode 10 : 2017)

Before my blog gets buried deep in the internet of things, I am officially returning on this and making the fifth post of this year today! This was something that had to be posted during the IPL this year but has been delayed to this point where we are only four months away from the start of the next season. Before getting into the exciting mood of new things that are bound to happen in the eleventh season, let's get back to the tenth anniversary of IPL that happened in 2017.

The team in Home apparel for 2017.

As usual, I tried to predict the jersey design for this year in the blog post I wrote in March of this year before IPL-10 started. (Read it here!) The prediction turned out to be 'almost true' with the retention of Zeven's base design of 2016; Gionee making its way to the belly and an unaltered Kingfisher logo on the back. Though the other sponsors were accurate in the prediction, the placement and colour masks of the logos on the sleeves slightly changed in the real one.

THE HOME JERSEY

THE AWAY JERSEY

As you can notice and I predicted, Gionee acquired the spotlight this year with their logo placed on the prominent front part of the jersey. The IPL 10th anniversary logo was given its mandatory slot on the sleeve and surprisingly, Britannia's very long association saw an end this year. The slot used by Britannia was taken by Duroflex Mattresses in this season.

Virat Kohli and AB DeVilliers in Away jerseys.

LYF+ Smartphone was replaced by Jio Telecom, a flagship brand from the same parent company. Two versions of Jio logo have been used on the jerseys, the one with red background on the Home and Game for Green jersey and the one with blue background on the Away jersey. As stated earlier, Kingfisher and Lloyd continue to enjoy their real estate on the right-chest and the back of the jersey respectively.

The Game for Green jersey remained very similar to the Home attire only with the primary colour changed to a lighter shade of green. Also, the twitter handles of the players which were used on the green jerseys traditionally by RCB were dropped and replaced with actual names similar to other games in this season.

The team in the green apparel for 2017.

Apart from jerseys, there were no changes in the trousers with Zeven and 7UP retaining their slots. The headgear continued to display Himalaya Men logo on one side while a new entrant WROGN, Virat Kohli's own brand made its way to the back of the caps replacing Acer from last year.

The team in the Home jersey for 2017.

This season was hugely disappointing for the ardent fanbase of RCB. I would call it '10 Years of Badluck' and eagerly hope for the next season to be ours! Massive changes are expected to happen for the 2018 season for the team as well as the tournament. I expect lots of changes on the RCB jerseys too, with a huge possibility of change in the apparel sponsor as well.

Stay tuned for more!