NEW DELHI (NEWS.com.au) -- Bollywood and cricket come together with the launch of the Indian Premier League in a frenzied extravaganza of glitz and glamour that will set the tone for a global revolution.

With once-suspicious players from every cricketing nation clamoring for berths in the incredibly lucrative Twenty20 competition's eight teams, the extent to which the sport is set to be changed became clear as details emerged of the hoopla and razzamatazz planned for the opening game of the 45-day, 59-match series.
Flamboyant Indian liquor and airline baron Vijay Mallya, owner of the Bangalore Royal Challengers, has, it was disclosed, spent a staggering $1.5 million to promote his team for the first of the IPL matches, bringing in Bollywood stars, singers, dancers, rap artists, base jumpers and even a team of 14 Washington Redskins National Football League cheerleaders for the match.
“From sizzling dances, bubble acts, rapping artists to stilt walkers and cheerleaders, we have left little in terms of entertainment for the opening ceremony,” Amrit Thomas, a Mallya official, said last night.
The Bangalore Royal Challengers (Mallya owns the Royal Challenge whisky brand) will meet top Bollywood hunk Shah Rukh Khan's Kolkata Knight Riders in the opening game -- a team coached by John Buchanan which includes Ricky Pointing and David Hussey as well as West Indies captain Chris Gayle and New Zealand star Brendon McCullum under the captaincy of Sourav Ganguly.
Buchanan, speaking in Kolkata before his team left for Bangalore, said he expected the Knight Riders to do well in the competition, in which there is prizemoney of almost $4 million at stake.
“It's a good team,” Buchanan said. “We have some excellent players in the side and I expect them to do well.”
Mallya's Bangalore Royal Challengers, captained by Rahul Dravid and including Nathan Bracken, Anil Kumble, South African Jacques Kallis and Pakistan's Misbah-ul-Haq, is valued at a staggering $111.6 million. Shah Rukh Khan's team is valued at $75.09 million.
Hence the hype and razzamatazz as Mallya and Shah Rukh Khan as well as other investors, including Bollywood star Prety Zinta, owner of the Mohali Kings XI Punjab side that includes Brett Lee and James Hopes in the line-up, seek to recover their money in a display of crass commercialism that will doubtless leave W.G. Grace turning in his grave.
The intention of the rich and powerful Board of Control for Cricket in India is simply to ride off the back of India's win in last year's Twenty20 World Cup in South Africa and, it hopes, create a new global competition that arouses the same passions and devotion -- and money -- that the Barclays Premier League does in football.
“We want to see the same passion and excitement that develops among, say, fans of Manchester United or Arsenal or Chelsea,” a senior BCCI official said.
“Yes, with all the same commercialization and the huge transfer fees paid for players.
“It can only be good for the game of cricket and for the players.”
But can it?
As players clamor to join the IPL and get a share of the astonishing earnings being offered to Mahendra Singh Dhoni and Andrew Symonds, will the new competition really promote the sort of feverish excitement that the English premiership does?
Or will it, as some suggest, founder because, as the English writer Mike Marqusee, quoted in India's Outlook magazine has said: “English football loyalties have been created over many generations, and reflect the history of the clubs and areas they draw support from. The new IPL clubs are starting from scratch. They will try to market a local identity but even expensive advertising and glamorous merchandising cannot create this kind of long-term affinity.”
Each of the eight teams in the competition - the Bangalore Royal Challengers, Chennai Super Kings, Delhi Daredevils, Hyderabad Deccan Chargers, Kolkata Knight Riders, Mohali Kings XI, Mumbai Indians and the Jaipur Rajasthan Royals captained by Shane Warne - are city based.
But there is no history of inter-city rivalry in Indian sport, not least in cricket, and most people believe the IPL is going to have an uphill battle in promoting this and thereby achieving a vibrant support base for the teams.
And what of the cricket?
That most sagacious of commentators, Harsha Bhogle, well known to ABC listeners, wrote of the competition the other day: “I am waiting for some cricket to take place. In recent times you might have thought that the IPL was a new movie, a music video, a new page three toy or a non-banking finance company.
“You can put what you want on the cover of the book. It only sells if the story is good and that is how it is going to be with the IPL where cricket is currently the step-child grudgingly allowed into the family photograph.
“The cheerleaders might be good, the ads might be brilliant, but it is those boring run-outs and catches, those mundane inhabitants of the real world, that determines who wins and who loses.”
Bhogle added: “I know this sounds boring but the first thing I would like to see at the IPL is where the boundary rope is. If it's pulled in too much and hitting a six becomes an on-demand activity, cricket will cease to be a contest.”
Will the fans buy it? Will India's teeming, cricket-mad millions be turned on by the spectacle? Will they and the rest of the world become aficionados of the IPL and all its glitz and glamour? Will it change the face of cricket?
The next 45 days before the final in Mumbai on June 1 will tell. So, too, will the television ratings around the world