SuperSport confirmed on Tuesday evening that they have abandoned negotiations with CSA to be joint shareholders for the tournament that is supposedly kicking off in November this year.

JOHANNESBURG - Sports broadcasting company SuperSport has ended a proposed co-ownership deal for a new domestic T20 competition with Cricket South Africa.

SuperSport confirmed on Tuesday evening that they have abandoned negotiations with CSA to be joint shareholders for the tournament that is supposedly kicking off in November this year. The news now puts further doubt on the T20 competition that was postponed last year, formerly known as the Global T20 League.

In June this year SuperSport and CSA had announced that they had formed a new company called Newco that would own the new league that would consist of six teams rather than initial eight from the GLT20.

SuperSport CEO Gideon Khobane says that the protracted deal was unfortunate. “We had reached an in-principle agreement with Cricket South Africa regarding the co-ownership of this event in June this year. Since then the two parties have been engaged in amicable discussions regarding the details of the proposed relationship.

“We have used our best endeavors to reach consensus with CSA around the shareholding model but this has unfortunately not happened. The discussions on the in-principle shareholding agreement terminated on 23 July 2018.”

Despite SuperSport terminating the shareholding agreement, they are, however, still discussing broadcasting rights with CSA to televise the lucrative T20 tournament.

“We have therefore decided to discontinue negotiations on the shareholding, but we are engaged in negotiations with CSA to broadcast this event.”

CSA are already under pressure from some of the previous GLT20 owners who have threatened legal action against CSA if they are not included in the new tournament.

(Edited by Shimoney Regter)