A strong business focus, a collaborative effort and a friendly media are critical to take Indian sports eco system into the nexthigher orbit of growth.  Embedded in the new vision is the conscious effort to move away from a regime of extreme focus to cricket to an all-embracing sports regime that creates local niche games and heroes.

This seems to be the upshot of the SCORECARD 2014 - National Conference on Business of Sports, organized by CII in the capital today.  Important highlight of the conference was ferreting out of success stories that has helped games like football, hockey etc. that has helped to move up in the pecking order. Yet, a lot more needs  to be done to invoke the passion and zeal that these sports deserve.

Interestingly, the Conference was unique in its content orientation, profile of discussants and the level of participation. Newer ideations, perceptions and action plans have come up for heralding a new sports culture that touches the imagination of the people. Implicit in this scale of activity is building attractive models that can help create corporations to invest in sports, sustainable development of the sportsmen and building sport facilities across India, which can be accessed by everyone in India.

The most preferred route for enhancing business quotient in sports is introduction of league system.  The innovation that was brought about in the IPL has brought about a paradigm shift in how sports was managed, played, viewed, generated sponsorship and much beyond that.  It is instructive to emulate this success in other sports like hockey, athletics and football. The quantum jump that can be brought about in the profile of these games are immense but the underlying premise is that there is a lag effect for turning around such sports events. Patience, pragmatism and learning from the experience of other tournaments are basics to the gradual transformation of these sporting events.

Critical to the new eco sports system is the focus on coaching and coaching of coaches. Such a dispensation is conspicuous by its absence in the Indian scene today except for some recent examples wherein the world class coaches were brought in with the help of corporate sponsorships for the hockey league.  The football league which is expected to kick off shortly will also have services of the world class coaches. 

Media, the conference felt, can bring about the desired mind set transformation among sports persons, sports lovers, civil society and sports administration. It is one thing to have the state-of-the -art sports complexes. But more important is optimally using them for the common good. Economics of building large stadia can be rationalized by making them adaptable for various purposes. There are international examples of larger stadia being used  successfully for sports activities, social purposes and also in providing basic amenities for common man for walking, jogging  and for even organizing entertainment programs. This  culture could take strong roots in India. This may also  herald a new eco system in sports, where everyone will have a stake in the sports and  bring about a community connect.

Resource crunch was a major impediment in sports development. In this regard, a view was expressed that the mandate of the new companies act, which stipulates corporates to spend on corporate social responsibility should be channelized for building sports infrastructure across the country to provide accessibility to promising sports persons.

The commercial success of IPL was highlighted. But the spill over of that interest in other sports activities is conspicuous by its absence. Partly, media was responsible for that for not making heroes out of the events. For instance, PT Usha was the reigning champion in athletics for quite some time. India won the Olympics gold for several years. But those who scripted the Indian success were unsung and unheard. A new thinking has to permeate among the media to educate, package and report events and games that are perceived by the public as less important. That will help the sponsors and event managers to showcase these games.  

The best of Indian sports-cricket-fade into insignificance in terms of its brand value in comparison to revenue raked in by FIFA or even a third category football sporting club in UK or Germany.   This is where a collaborative effort of the corporate, the government and the media should be forged.

Some of the important speakers who addressed the conference include Mr Raghu Iyer, CEO, Rajasthan Royals, Mr Mustafa Ghouse, COO, JSW Bengaluru FC; Mr AmritMathur, Former COO, GMR Sports and Advisor, Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports; Dr Nathan Price, Personal Excellence Consultant, Australian Institute of Sport; Dr Paul Gastin, Associate Professor, Sport Science, Deakin University, Australia;  Mr Erick Haskell, MD, Adidas Group, India;  Ms Priti Srivastava, Vice President, Reliance Industries Ltd; Mr Virendra Kumar Mahendru, GM (Civil) and Head – Corporate Sports, ONGC; Mr Deepak Jolly, VP – Public Affairs and Communications, Coca-Cola India and SWA; Mr Thomas Abraham, Co-founder & Editorial Director, Sportz Network Pvt Ltd, Mr Rajesh Sethi, CEO, Ten Sports; Mr Santosh Desai, MD &CEO, Future Brands Ltd and Mr Harish Krishnamachar, Country Head and Sr VP, World Sport Group.