The ICC is aiming to launch its first mobile cricket game offering, as it looks to diversify revenue streams in anticipation of a potential slowdown in the value of future broadcast rights. Though cricket gaming has a history stretching back decades, this is believed to be the first time the game’s governing body will develop its own game and, in the process, claim a share in what is seen as a lucrative, swift-growth market.
The ICC’s digital team will make a presentation on its plans to the chief executives’ committee (CEC) at the ICC’s board meetings, which begin from today in Harare. The idea has been discussed at previous meetings, but the ICC is looking to now get a green light from Full Members to put a tender out for developers to build a game that will, at least initially, be a mobile offering.
Most fans will remember the EA Sports’ Cricket series, or Codemaster’s Brian Lara Cricket on games consoles, and there have been numerous other games stretching back to the 1980s. In recent years, a limited number of mobile cricket games have tasted success.
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In this scenario, the ICC owning a game offering could be a key moment. The gold standard – first on games consoles and then on mobiles – remains FIFA’s wildly successful 30-year partnership with games developer EA Sports, which only ended in 2023. But much will depend on how the ICC negotiates a complex landscape for players’ name, image and likeness (NIL) rights. One of the reasons EA Sports ended its cricket series in 2007 was because securing licensing rights for player names was such a logistical nightmare – the last edition famously had rights for players from some teams but fictitious names that bore a likeness to the real names for players from other countries, including India.
The ICC signs up NIL rights for all squads that participate in their tournaments but only for the duration of those events. All cricket outside of it, bilateral, domestic and franchise, is outside the ICC’s remit. For a game that aims to have national teams playing against each other as well as T20 franchises or domestic T20 teams in action, the ICC will have to come to licensing agreements with individual boards (in countries that don’t have player associations) – such as India and Pakistan – as well as the World Cricketers’ Association (WCA), the global players’ body.
In early 2024, WCA signed a long-term partnership with Winners Alliance, an affiliate of the Novak Djokovic-backed Professional Tennis Players Association (PTPA). It is Winners Alliance that will handle deals such as this on behalf of cricketers who are members of WCA-affiliated players’ associations, such as those in Australia, England, New Zealand and South Africa. WCA is aware of the ICC’s plans for the game but has not indicated how it intends to respond to any approach.
An idea of how complicated it could get is evident from recent reports in Australia’s Telegraph and the New Zealand Herald which revealed ongoing disputes (with the potential to become legal) between Cricket Australia (CA) and New Zealand Cricket (NZC) with their players over player NIL rights for digital games. In both instances, the boards are in dispute with player associations over the use of player images in a game offering on the Real Cricket app – in New Zealand’s case, the board has already signed an NIL deal with another app in India. Last year in August, WCA (with which player associations in Australia and New Zealand are affiliated) and Winners Alliance signed a deal with the Real Cricket app for player NIL rights.
An official familiar with the landscape says there are around 100 companies using players in various games without authorisation or onward revenues to players – revenues which can often be significant. It is the right to those revenues that WCA and Winners Alliance want to enforce and protect for their players.
The ICC recognises it will need to come to some form of a licensing agreement with WCA, but given the often adversarial nature of the relationship – and they have sparred over similar issues recently – any agreement might not be straightforward.
Acquiring rights for Indian players – with no player association and so, no affiliation with WCA – could be vital to its success, as could rights for IPL franchise names, given its status as the most lucrative tournament in cricket. One official said early discussions suggested IPL franchises would not be willing to license their names to the ICC’s game.
The size of the mobile gaming market in India – several reports put the 2024 value at around US$3 billion and growing swiftly – is one of the reasons the ICC is keen to get in. It sees such a game as providing a necessary additional revenue stream in an environment in which indications are that it might not be able to secure again the kind of record-breaking broadcast deal it did in this rights cycle.
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