Elite Pro Basketball League gives players platform to excel, see the game grow: CEO Sunny Bhandarkar

Noida (Uttar Pradesh) [India], March 20 : Elite Pro Basketball League (EPBL) CEO Sunny Bhandarkar has said that the aim behind the league was to develop potential of players, provide good infrastructure to hone their skills and to also provide them a platform to earn rewards.
Bhandarkar told ANI in an interview that he was keen to work towards improving the sport infrastructure in the country.
"I have been working in sports, especially in the universities for a decade. What I have noticed is that many players play on cemented courts, with broken backboards and nets. The facilities provided are not up to the mark. And this is only about the universities, let alone the professional side. I am from a sports family, with my parents being handball and basketball players. I saw all this as a kid and always wondered what I could do to change things," said Sunny to ANI.
"My parents inspired my journey. I had a dream of standing on the Olympic podium with my national anthem playing. I wanted to reach a great level," added Sunny.
Sunny said that he used to hear complaints of corruption, favouritism and bias in selection process.
"We decided to keep EBPL open to all and held first trials for national-level players. 350 athletes came to Hyderabad. There were more, who said that they also wanted to play. So we started wildcard tryouts. These were open to all, be it a local player or someone playing the sport in their backyards. They were held in Chennai and Delhi. These tryouts attracted 1,600-1,700 athletes. We selected 204 athletes and have 100 standby athletes too," he said.
The CEO said that basketball is a popular sport in India, given how many schools have basketball courts/hoops that help a child get exposed if they want to play, but it lacks a certain milestone that a player would like to achieve, like playing in Indian Premier League (IPL) if one is good in cricket.
"Basketball is not popular as a prime sport. The main challenges (in starting EBPL) were lack of facilities and a lack of support from local authorities. So we decided to use a portable court that we make ourselves and we carry it from city to city. We need proper wooden flooring to play. A proper playing surface changes the grip, amount of dribble and bounce," added Sunny.
He said that another issue related to sports in India is that many people want to take up sports just to represent India and get a government job later on.
"For me, this is not a good enough reason to excel at the international level. We thought of giving players a platform through EBPL through which they could earn well and also witness the game grow."
Sunny believes that it is really unfair that India ranks at number 82 in the world rankings and said that there is a need to analyse what is going wrong.
Through our platform, we want them (players) to believe that if they want to become better than LeBron James and Michael Jordan, if they can and want to perform at that level, they will get rewarded for it."
On starting the Elite Pro Women's Basketball League, Sunny said that earlier he was hesitant about starting it due to fears of lack of response.
"But when we held wildcard tryouts and 1,600-1,700 athletes came up, we got queries that why it was not open for women. One random person asked me to try. When we launched it and released the news for wildcard tryouts, 500 women athletes came for the first tryouts. We now have six teams for the first season of the Elite Pro Women's Basketball League (EBWPL), instead of two as planned as earlier.
The tryouts for the EPWBL were held from March 17 to March 20.
Elite Pro Basketball League (EPBL) is a professional franchise 5x5 basketball league in India. It has 12 franchises and the inaugural season took place from March 15 to 20 in Delhi. The 12 franchises include Punjab Gladiators, Jaipur Giants, Kochi Pachers, Delhi Dominators, Lucknow Swarm, Hyderabad Hoops, Mumbai Stars, Chandigarh Conquerors, Pune Pythons, Bengaluru Stallions, Ahmedabad Aces and Chennai Turbos.
It features all the top players of Indian Basketball - Jagdeep Bains, Pratham Singh and Prakash Mishra - The key signings include Indian national team players like Jagdeep Bains (Mumbai Stars), Pratham Singh (Pune Pythons) Prakash Mishra (Jaipur Giants). Other players include Basil Philip (Kochi Pachers), Vinay Kaushik ( Chandigarh Conquerors), actor Arvind Krishna (Hyderabad Hoops), Ram Gopal (Lucknow Swarm), Ravikumar (Chennai Turbos), Rachit Singh (Punjab Gladiators), Karan Pal Singh (Ahmedabad Aces), Arshdeep Singh (Delhi Dominators) and Visu Palani (Bengaluru Stallions).