Cricket eSports And The Indian Market
India, Cricket, and Gaming
Some would say India is obsessed with Cricket, and that’s a fact. Half a billion people are watching Cricket matches in India alone. That’s impressive given India’s 1.4 billion population, and that means 30% of Indians are fans of Cricket. The sport of Cricket is played in teams of 11 players that are awarded points for various objectives. Cricket is regulated by the ICC ( International Cricket Council). It comes as no surprise that India has gifted the world a large number of Cricket legends like Sachin Tendulkar or Rahul Dravid. Indians worship their legends due to the religious status that Cricket holds.
The same can be said about Gaming in India as it has seen a massive boom with over 300 million Indians engaging in various forms of online gaming. Competitive gaming is also gaining tremendous traction, with roughly 17 million Indians picking up the mouse and keyboard and trying to eradicate their opposition. India holds close to 10% out of the entire eSports worldwide market with USD 94m in revenue.
Cricket eSport Growth Inevitable
It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see where things are headed. So many Indians passionate about gaming and cricket are bound to materialize into cricket eSports sooner rather than later.
Other major sports have successfully transitioned to eSports like FIFA 21, PES, NBA 2K, or Madden. The sports that are best represented at the moment are Football, American Football, Basketball, and Baseball. And having so many users play these games has caused the publishers to organize tournaments where players can fight for the lion’s share in cash. The sports genre eSports have the advantage of drawing a crowd from both sports fans and gaming enthusiasts.
Having two considerable pools to draw viewership from has done wonders for the genre. Cricket has been making baby steps towards having a reliable game of their own in Real Cricket 20. And they even organized the first eCricket World Series back in 2020. The tournament offered modest prizes and attracted modest viewership as a result.
The Future of Cricket as an eSport & Betting market in India
When players get emotionally attached to a game or the game’s outcome, they are known to gamble on these emotions. Cricket has been a leader in India when it comes to gambling, and there’s an impressive array of gambling sites catering to Indian gamblers. These sites usually have generous entry offers for new players where they get various bonuses to dip their toes in the water. There’s no reason why the same cannot happen with Cricket eSports and gambling. The Cricket fantasy games where professional eSports athletes compete against each other have immense gambling potential. The Indian casino industry is closely linked with the gambling industry, sometimes managed by the same offshore operators. This relationship will undoubtedly pave the way for an even faster rise in eSports gambling within India.
The Indian eSports federations have identified the apparent potential of Cricket as an eSport, and they are ranking eSports players as of 2021. Teams of gamers that are engaged in a large variety of games were invited to a gaming boot camp, and after competitive testing, they were assigned a national level rank. This is an admirable initiative that will only bring sustainable growth and success in future eSports tournaments. Call of Duty Mobile ( Battle Royale), Valorant, and FreeFire are the most popular eSports titles played in India, so the ranking has been built around these titles. They took over 150 matches played in these Titles as the basis of the ranking. The matches took place between November and December of 2020.
Online gaming culture has been taking both developing and developed countries by storm in recent years. Anyone with a smartphone is free to leave their mark on gaming or eSports. You can already tell that India has everything it needs to take over eSports. Roughly 600 million Indians are following Cricket games closely, and 300 million are gamers; it’s the perfect recipe for the growth of Cricket as an eSport. Game developers have already identified the vast potential a high-quality cricket video game holds and are actively pushing towards such games. The future of eSports, gaming, and Cricket looks incredibly promising.
