Strengths
• The Indian Premier League (IPL) is based upon the Twenty20 cricket game which should be completed in 2 ½ hours. That means that is fast-paced and exciting, and moreover it can be played on a weekday evening or weekend afternoon. That makes it very appealing as a mass sport, just like American Football, Basketball and Soccer. It is appealing as a spectator sport, as well to TV audiences.
• The IPL has employed economists to structure its lead so that revenue is maximized. The more unified the sport, the more successful it is.
Weaknesses
• Twenty20 has been so popular that it could replace other forms of cricket i.e. damage the game that generated it.
• Some fans will also have to pay for travel to the ground. There may be large queues for the most popular games. There may be some distance between where the fan lives and the cricket ground.
• Stakes are very high! Some teams may not weather short-term failures and may be too quick to get rid of key managers and players if things don't go well quickly. Famously, Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) sacked their CEO Charu Sharma for watching his team lose 6 from their first 8 games.
• Some teams have overpriced their advertising/sponsorship in order to gain some short-term returns (e.g. Royal Challengers), and some sponsors and are moving their investment the more reasonably priced teams.
Opportunities
• Since it has a large potential mass audience, IPL is very attractive as a marketing communications opportunity, especially for advertisers and sponsors.
• The league functions under a number of franchises. Each franchisee is responsible for marketing its team to gain as large a fan-base as possible. The long-term success of all of the franchises lies in the generation of a solid fan-base. The fan-base will generate large TV revenues.
• Different fans will pay different amounts to watch their sport. There will be corporate hospitality, season