True Sports, an exclusive 24 x 7 Sports entertainment channel, was launched on Monday, 20th March, 2017 at the glittering ceremony of Times of India Sports Awards (TOISA). During the TOISA event, Mr. Zahir Rana, CEO and Mr. Manish Rach, COO of True Sports were invited on the stage to hand over the awards of Cricket Category.
The Jury’s choice for best Cricketer award went to Ravichandran Ashwin while Virat Kohli was adjudged for people’s choice award. As both the cricketers are away playing test matches, Mr. Rahul Johri, CEO, BCCI received awards for Ashwin from Mr. Zahir Rana and for Virat from Actress Neetu Chandra respectively.
Addressing the audience, Mr. Manish J. Rach, COO of True Sports thanked TOISA for having given them a great platform to launch True Sports, which would telecast True Premier League (TPL). Conceptualised by Mr. Zahir Rana, CEO of True Sports, TPL is India’s first Cricket Talent Hunt and Reality Show.
The core objective of TPL is to unearth young Cricketing talents from major cities, towns, and small towns and offer them a platform to play professional cricket and make a career out this sport. Mr. Manish also added proudly that many renowned former cricket stars from India and abroad have consented to mentor the players selected to play TPL.
Just to name a few, Mohammed Azharuddin, Vinod Kambli, Chetan Sharma have already been signed in this regard for TPL. We are sure that many new cricketing stars would emerge from TPL, Mr. Manish added.
Later talking to Media persons, Mr. Zahir Rana said that first time ever a Cricket Talent Hunt with Reality Show is happening in India at a larger scale. Public is empowered to vote for their favourite players while the game is on and the winners would be felicitated with prize money and awards.
To start with TPL would be launched in Maharashtra by inviting young talented cricketers to register free to play TPL’s Twenty20 matches. After the training camp and filtration, around 500 teams would be selected in Maharashtra to play matches among them. The inaugural match of TPL would be played in Mumbai amidst funfair.
To add glamour quotient, many Bollywood stars and TV stars would cheer the team, Mr. Zahir Rana further said.
TPL’s Super Franchisee for Maharashtra is Four Pillars Event Management Services Ltd. and its Directors – Mr. Sameer Pawani, Mr. Manish Lanjekar, Mr. Sidharth Kumar, Mr. Rishi Shukla were also present at the TOISA function. When asked about what prompted FOUR PILLARS to be the part of TPL, Mr. Sameer Pawani mentioned that it’s an innovative idea to reach grassroots level to identify talents and bring them to light.
ooking at the immense potential of TPL, we felt it not only makes business sense but also would give us a lot of satisfaction for contributing our bit to the sports.
