Before the 2025 Indian Premier League was suspended, Kolkata's Eden Gardens had already hosted their final group match of the league, on May 7, between Chennai Super Kings and home team Kolkata Knight Riders. Following this, Kolkata has the right to host one playoff and the final of the league. Keeping in mind that Kolkata Knight Riders has been eliminated from the playoff race, the cross-border tensions have paused the tournament.
BCCI vice president Rajeev Shukla, in an interview, said that the decision of suspension came as an immediate effect of cross-border tensions and that the tournament will resume after a week. In such a scenario, Eden Gardens was seen to take down IPL branding from the galleries. But what is the main reason behind it?
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Here are the possible causes why the branding has been taken off:
1| Banner branding: During the group stages, the particular home ground bears the team logo in each banner, apart from the IPL logos. That means the banners in Eden Gardens had the logo of the Kolkata Knight Riders on every banner and the tagline on banners of special galleries like that of the clubhouse of the B Premium. Here is a glimpse of a stand of Kolkata Knight Riders right before the day of the opening match against Royal Challengers Bengaluru.
Cricketgully/Ritwika Nag
The banners for finals and playoffs look different. Eden Gardens hosted the last final in 2015, between Mumbai Indians and Chennai Super Kings, when IPL was sponsored by Pepsi. Here is how the banners looked then, in the final.
Screengrab/Youtube
Even the 2024 final, the one between Sunrisers Hyderabad and Kolkata Knight Riders, has seen similar banners in the gallery of Chennai's M. Chidambaram Stadium. And it looked like this:
Screengrab/YouTube
The final's banner normally has the venue's name and the tournament's logo, and the same goes with the playoff versions.
2| Possible relocation: After the suspension, there was lots of speculation going on that the remainder of the tournament will be shifted to some other place, and it might go outside India as soon as the situation eases down. Even though provided a timeline of a week, the tensions must settle before the airports can function properly in order to carry the crew to some other country or state.
Despite Shukla's timeline, there are simultaneous speculations going on that the tournament might resume in September's window, as India might withdraw from the Asia Cup 2025, and that might neutralize the tournament itself.
