IPL 2025: As the 2025 Indian Premier League (IPL 2025) season gets closer, the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) held a meeting in Mumbai on Thursday with the team captains and referees.
Key Rule Changes for IPL 2025
During the meeting, they discussed and approved some important rule changes, including allowing the use of saliva again and keeping the Impact Player rule. These changes are expected to make the IPL 2025 season, starting on March 22, more exciting and bring new dynamics to the game.
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Here’s a quick rundown of the key updates for this season:
1. Saliva Ban Lifted:
One of the biggest changes this season is that players are now allowed to use saliva to shine the cricket ball again. This ban was put in place during the COVID-19 pandemic for safety reasons. After talking with team captains, most of them agreed to lift the ban, and now the BCCI has allowed saliva again. This change is expected to bring back swing and reverse swing in the game, something that players like Mohammed Shami and Tim Southee have supported.
2. Second Ball Introduced:
To deal with the dew that affects night matches, the BCCI has decided to introduce a second ball for the second innings of evening games. This change is meant to improve the conditions for bowlers.
The new ball will be used after the 11th over. Umpires will decide if the ball needs to be changed depending on the dew conditions. This rule is designed to make the game more fair, reducing any advantage captains might get from winning the toss in matches affected by dew.
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3. Impact Player Rule to Continue:
The IPL will keep using the Impact Player rule, which lets teams substitute one player during a match. This rule will continue at least until 2027, as approved by the BCCI. Although some captains like Hardik Pandya and Rohit Sharma have raised concerns about the strategy behind it, the rule has given uncapped players a chance to play, which they might not have had otherwise.
“Yes, the good all-rounders – Axar, Jadeja and others – continued to find a way in the XI but more options meant someone like Washington Sundar hardly played in 2024. So overall development of players like Washington Sundar was certainly impacted but at the same time, coaches had more options to play with.”
“Like beefing up batting or strengthen bowling as per the game requirement. Whatever was happening, the spectators and viewers weren’t complaining because the match wasn’t over even when it was 50/4 or 200/3,” a franchise official was quoted as saying.
Jay Shah shared his thoughts on the ongoing discussion about the Impact Player rule, weighing both its pros and cons.
“We had a long chat with the franchise owners in the recent meeting we had. The impact player rule has its pros and cons. The negative is that it makes the allrounder’s role redundant. The positive is it creates a spot for an Indian player to showcase his talent. We should also think about the broadcaster, who is paying a lot of money. But as an administrator for me, the game is bigger. We will decide in a few days,” Jay Shah was quoted saying by TOI last year.
4. DRS for Height and Off-side Wides:
The Decision Review System (DRS) will now be used to review calls for height wides and wides outside the off-stump. This expands the use of DRS to help make more accurate decisions.
Hawk-Eye technology and ball tracking will be used to help umpires make accurate decisions on height wides and wides outside the off-stump.
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