Effectively a franchised Twenty20 club cricket tournament, the inaugural Cape Premier League will be played in Cape Town in April 2019.
Teams
Six teams – Atlantic Pirates, District Sixers, Cape Vikings, Dromedaris Dragons, Hoeri Kwaggo Bulls and Knysna Falcons – will participate. Each team is owned by a company, which will appoint some coaches from around the Western Cape Cricket Association premier league and first division A.
Companies involved are AFFA Holdings, Punit Balan Entertainment Limited, Smartrac and others.
Coaches in contention are Western Province coach Paul Adams and assitant coach Dieter Swanepoel, Victoria Cricket Club’s Myles Williamson, Tygerberg Cricket Club’s Brindley Gilbert, University of Cape Town Cricket Club’s Eugene Moleon, Strandfontein Cricket Club’s Keanan Mitchell, Durbanville Cricket Club’s Manny Senger and others.
Player auction
Each team will be allocated a fictional currency of three million ‘CPL dollars’ to spend at Friday, 25 January 2019’s player auction at Newlands.
The auction list will feature approximately 130 players from the premier league and first division A – as well as some Cape Cobras, Western Province and academy cricketers. The auction will see 96 of the 130 purchased. The players, who will be weighted according to form and priced accordingly, will soon be notified of their eligibility for the auction via their respective clubs.
The auction’s inclusion of some premier league and first division A cricketers, but not others, is based entirely on statistics provided by WebSports for the 2018-19 and 2017-18 Western Province Cricket Association seasons, collated by founder Ziyaad Desai and fellow tournament organisers.
A squad of 16 must be purchased. Two under-21 players must be acquired, one of which must play every match.
When will the CPL happen?
The tournament is scheduled for three weekends across 5, 6, 12, 13, 26 and 27 April 2019. These Saturdays and Sundays might be joined by Fridays 4, 11 and 18 April.
Where are the venues?
Wynberg Cricket Club, Western Province Cricket Club’s Wally Wilson Oval and Vineyard Oval and Langa Cricket Club have been mooted as venues. Wynberg Cricket Club might host day-night fixtures, subject to floodlight effectiveness. Newlands will also be considered, dependent on availability.
What is the tournament format?
Round one will see teams play each other once. The team at the bottom of the standings after round one will be removed. The remaining five will play each other again in round two. The table-topping team after round one will go directly into the final, while the second- and third-placed teams will contest a play-off for the second berth in the final.
A bonus-point system will be implemented during round-one and -two fixtures. A positive and negative bonus-points system, too, has been conceptualised. No bonus points will be allocated in rain-affected matches.