According to a recent media report, IPL 2016 has not quite been the huge hit it BCCI would have hoped it would be. The stands are not always full, with several major venues not filled to capacity. Broadcaster worry may also appear on the horizon soon.

The ninth edition of the IPL is underway. The tournament takes place annually. Every year, a near-2 month window is set aside for IPL matches. The international calendar is disrupted. But no one cares much because the IPL rakes in the moolah for BCCI as well as international players willing to reconsider playing even for their country in order to play IPL.

Is the relatively poor attendance at IPL games this season indicative of a malaise that has set in, or are the factors responsible for this only temporary?

For the Indian public, Indian players at the IPL are major attractions, despite the presence of international players the likes of Chris Gayle, David Warner, Dale Steyn, AB de Villiers etc. How India perform at Twenty20 games or in tournaments affects the mood of the paying public. The last time an IPL was held immediately after a world tournament was last year when India made the World Cup semifinals in Australia. In 2011, the IPL began a few days after India had lifted the World Cup. Spectator interest was high and Indians were generally enthusiastic about watching their stars wreck havoc in the shortest form of the game.

This year, India failed to beat West Indies at the ICC World Twenty20 semifinals despite the tournament being played at home. India’s performance was scratchy and unconvincing, with Virat Kohli pulling the team along into the semis. The bowling was overhyped and was exposed in the semifinal. Barring Kohli and Dhoni, the less said about batting the better.

But India have also been playing way too much T20 cricket of late. Before the World Twenty20 came the Asia Cup which was, for the first time, a Twenty20 tournament. India also played three T20 internationals in Australia earlier this year. The T20 cow is being milked dry and there is no respite for the next five and a half weeks.

The apparently declining interest in IPL may also have something to do with – as we said before – the fact that the tournament happens on an annual basis. Eight teams are thrown together each year, and play 14 games each in colourful clothing on which the sponsors’ logos are more visible than the colouring itself. At least 74 games are played every season, incompetent commentators howl nonsense in the pre-match show and in the commentary box, every boundary is announced with the sponsor’s name attached before it, and there is a general atmosphere of careless glee. IPL has never been as much about cricket as about commercialised entertainment, and over the last few seasons even those in the box aren’t pretending to conceal that.

The BCCI will milk the IPL cash cow for as long as it can, because it has proved beyond doubt that money is what matters in the end. The BCCI though, is itself embroiled in a struggle to preserve its autonomy and opaque organisational structure and institutions. It is losing the battle. Will this change the fortunes of the IPL?

Declining interest was once a problem faced by Test cricket, then by One Day cricket. But is Twenty20 also going down that road? The crowds at the World T20 weren’t great for non-India matches. But then, the Big Bash 2015 saw record attendance figures. Thus, it is too early to pass judgement. It seems however, that the shorter the format of the game, the quicker it gets redundant. To add to this impression, T20 cricket as a whole has begun to become more and more formulaic just like the older formats.

The rigmarole the BCCI is stuck in over the Lodha Committee report has prevented the paying public from forgetting about the IPL’s betting and fixing controversies too. Remember the 2000 match fixing controversy, which hurt interest in Indian cricket for a while until the nation produced new heroes and a daring new captain in Sourav Ganguly?

Lastly, IPL 9 so far hasn’t set the stands on fire. Teams batting first have lost 12 out of 13 games, with 140 being the average score. It is undeniable that Twenty20 is a true batsman’s game – people expect a windfall of boundaries and sixes every time – and this IPL has belied that expectation.

But is it too early to judge spectator interest? Previous IPLs have shown that viewership grows as the tournament enters its critical stages. Nevertheless, it is time for the BCCI to think about the overdose of IPL with some foresight. Otherwise, the country that embraced Twenty20 cricket after much hesitation will be the first one to strike a nail in its coffin.