IPL marginalises other atheletes training for olympics

Sections of India's sporting community fear that the cricket board's new professional Twenty20 league will eat into sponsorship revenue that could have gone to athletes preparing for the Beijing Olympics in August.

The multi-million dollar Indian Premier League (IPL), featuring a majority of the game's leading international players in the eight franchises, will get underway on April 18 and is poised to become one of the most lucrative sporting events in Asia.

India's thriving advertising industry sees the IPL as a potential goldmine in a retail-booming economy and the franchises are also looking to acquire individual sponsorships.