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'Mera desh badal rha hai' - Fans react as Indian Players likely to participate in Saudi Arabia's richest T20 league

The Saudi Arabian government has reportedly held talks with Indian Premier League owners, in a plan that could change the format forever

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Rohit Kumar
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Indian players likely to play in Saudi Arabia richest T20 League (Source - Twitter)

Indian players likely to play in Saudi Arabia richest T20 League (Source - Twitter)

Saudi Arabia is planning to organise the richest T20 league in the world and is also likely to propose the idea to the Indian Premier League owners. The Saudi Arabian government recently organised a Formula 1 event named Saudi Arabian Grand Prix. It now looks like that they want to invest in multiple sports to attract everyone.

They have approached the IPL owners and are also hoping that the Indian Cricket Board will allow the Indian players to play in their league to generate more engagement. However, it isn't unknown that the Indian players are not allowed to play in other leagues except IPL.

The Age reported that discussions on the Saudi Arabian league had been ongoing for almost a yearnow. Any prospective Gulf league would need to receive approval from the apex cricket body and its member nations, including Australia.

Saudi Arabia has come under fire for trying to cover up its poor record on human rights by investing substantially in prominent sports and events around the world, notably the Public Investment Fund's purchase of Premier League club Newcastle United.

Saudi Arabia are pretty keen to invest in sport: Greg Barclay

After massively funding other sports like football and Formula 1, the apex cricket body Chairman Greg Barclay, earlier, revealed that Saudi Arabia was eager to invest extensively in cricket.

“If you look at other sports they’ve been involved in, cricket is something I imagine would be attractive to them. Given their advance into sport more generally, cricket would work quite well for Saudi Arabia. They’re pretty keen to invest in sport, and given their regional presence, cricket would seem a pretty obvious one to pursue," said Barclay.

The ILT20, a T20 league created by the UAE, was also introduced last year, and many IPL owners became participants. Prince Saud bin Mishal Al-Saud, the president of the Saudi Arabian Cricket Organization, expects that Saudi Arabia would eventually become a "destination for global cricket."

Here's how fans reacted:

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