Firms across industries face mounting antitrust scrutiny from enforcers, legislators, and the plaintiffs’ bar. Sports teams and leagues are no exception. As the volume of sports commerce expands globally, so too does scrutiny from antitrust enforcers and litigants alike. Amid rising investment in and expansion of professional cricket leagues—including in the United States—it is prudent for companies operating in this space to monitor ongoing developments in sports and antitrust and to consider potential risks associated with certain business practices.
While antitrust risks in cricket may appear in a range of different scenarios, this article focuses on four primary issues:
As discussed below, each of these considerations requires a nuanced assessment of the realities of competition. And as cricket continues to grow in popularity in the United States, leagues, teams, and enterprises operating in adjacent spaces should consider the potential antitrust risks associated with their business decisions.
Cricket originated in rural 16th century England and evolved into an organized sport by the 18th century. In the 20th century, limited-overs formats like One-Day Internationals (ODIs) and Twenty20 (T20) transformed the game, making it faster and more commercially appealing. Today, it is one of the world’s most popular sports—attracting upwards of 2.5 billion fans globally. T20 cricket electrified the sport by offering faster paced matches in contrast to the longer format Test played over five days. This shortened format transformed how cricket is marketed, distributed, and consumed, contributing to the growth of its global fan base.
This is particularly evident in the United States, where cricket is booming, attracting billions of dollars in investment. For example, in the summer of 2023, the cricket governing body in the United States, USA Cricket, sanctioned the country’s first professional T20 league, Major League Cricket (MLC), with six teams from across the country. The inaugural season featured six teams representing major cities, with matches held in venues like Grand Prairie Stadium in Texas and Church Street Park in North Carolina. The tournament exceeded financial expectations, generating approximately $8 million in revenue, and concluded with MI New York clinching the championship.
In early 2025, MLC announced plans to expand the league from six to eight teams by 2027, develop new stadiums and related infrastructure, lengthen the T20 season, and assess expanding the league into Canada. In addition to these developments, in 2024, the United States co-hosted the T20 World Cup—which attracted billions of dollars in investment and millions of viewers. The tournament featured matches in New York, Florida, and Texas, significantly elevating the sport's profile. A standout moment was the US team's unexpected advancement, which few in the international cricket community expected, out of the group stage and into the “Super 8” round.
Cricket’s continued growth is also evident at the grassroots level. Recent estimates indicate that there are more than 400 cricket leagues across the country, encompassing more than 200,000 active players. This growth is largely attributed to the influx of immigrants from cricket-loving nations, enriching the sport's cultural tapestry and expanding its fan base in the United States. And it was recently announced that the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics will feature cricket as an Olympic sport for the first time in more than a century.
Antitrust laws are designed to promote and protect competition and prevent unfair business practices that harm consumers and stifle innovation. While to some, the sport industry may not seem like an obvious target for antitrust laws, at their core, sports leagues, including cricket leagues, are commercial enterprises. And as with any commercial enterprise, sports teams and leagues face accusations of unfair competition and anticompetitive business practices.
A unique challenge here, however, is that leagues and their governing bodies necessarily require a certain level of coordination and collaboration among independent actors. This level of coordination on its face can appear problematic under the antitrust laws, but it arguably serves the procompetitive purpose of enabling the functioning of a league. Thus, balancing the risks associated with improper and unfair business collaborations that undermine competition with the required collaborative framework of leagues, creates potential gray areas where antitrust risks may arise. This is particularly relevant to nascent professional and amateur sports, like cricket, in the United States.
More specifically, antitrust risks in sports are present in a variety of contexts, including, for example, the sanctioning and formation of professional and amateur leagues, selecting venues for matches, licensing and broadcasting deals, and restrictions on team and player mobility. This is not an exhaustive list, but it is designed to give a sense of the types of issues that could result in antitrust risk.
As cricket continues to grow in popularity in the United States, it is prudent for entities contemplating forming new professional and/or amateur leagues to consider these potential antitrust risks.
Operating a league may invite antitrust scrutiny because leagues operate as collective entities comprising multiple independent stakeholders, including teams that compete against one another. While these leagues are essential for establishing a governing framework for the league and organizing matches, among other things, their structure can generate antitrust scrutiny. For example, leagues often place limitations upon who may participate in a particular league, where they can play matches, or the timing and/or conditions of athletes moving from one team to another. While such limitations may be justified for several reasons, they may still result in accusations of anticompetitive exclusionary conduct from rival leagues, nascent teams, or enterprises seeking to participate in the league.
Antitrust claims can also arise right out of the gates in the formation of a league. For example, in 2019, USA Cricket was sued under the antitrust laws by a losing bidder when USA Cricket selected a partner to operate Major League Cricket in the United States. The plaintiff accused USA Cricket of conspiring with the winning bidder to exclude it. However, the lawsuit was dismissed by a federal judge who found that the plaintiff, as the losing bidder, had not alleged a viable claim and that USA Cricket had the right to select a partner to work with to develop the league. [1]
In another recent example, FIFA and the United States Soccer Federation (USSF) faced an antitrust suit over their alleged adoption and enforcement of a market-division policy that prohibited staging unsanctioned official season matches off home soil. [2] The plaintiff in that lawsuit, an international sporting events promoter, alleged that the USSF’s policy was anticompetitive because it thwarted efforts by entities like the plaintiff to organize foreign league professional soccer matches in the United States in favor of USSF’s preferred promotion entity. The plaintiff ultimately settled the lawsuit with FIFA in October 2024 and with USSF in April 2025. Similarly, in 2023, the Varsity Cheer League settled with a class of plaintiffs who alleged that Varsity unlawfully acquired and maintained monopoly power in the competitive cheerleading market by impairing and buying up potential rivals and imposing exclusionary agreements on venues. [3]
A successful league can also face claims of attempted monopolization by new rival leagues. For example, USSF and Major League Soccer (MLS) were recently accused of colluding to exclude the upstart North American Soccer League (NASL). [4] NASL argued that the USSF’s decision to grant Division I status only to MLS amounted to an unlawful conspiracy to monopolize an alleged market for top-tier men’s professional soccer leagues in the United States and Canada. Although NASL’s claims were rejected after a jury trial, NASL recently moved for a new trial on the basis that the verdict form, jury instructions, and related orders were allegedly improper; prejudicial evidence tainted the verdict; and the court made several erroneous evidentiary rulings. As of this publication, the court has not ruled on NASL’s pending motion.
As new cricket leagues and teams emerge in the United States, it is important to consider potential antitrust risks associated with broadcasting rights. Sports leagues and television networks and/or streaming platforms often negotiate exclusive broadcasting contracts, which can result in accusations of limiting consumer choice, creating barriers to entry for competing media providers, and increasing costs for consumers to access content.
For example, in 2024, a jury ruled that the National Football League (NFL) had constrained consumer choice and inflated prices because its Sunday Ticket subscription service was offered only through a satellite provider and required subscribers to pay for a service that included all teams rather than allow subscribers to pay only for teams of their choosing. [5] In 2012, the National Hockey League faced a similar complaint, which it ultimately settled in 2015 after agreeing to offer an unbundled package of games at discounted prices. [6]
The growing popularity of cricket in the United States presents an exciting opportunity for new sponsorship, branding, and licensing deals. But merchandising, licensing, or sponsorship agreements may present risks, especially if the agreements contain exclusivity terms, and/or are otherwise perceived as restricting other businesses from accessing branding opportunities.
Licensing team merchandise can raise potential antitrust concerns, particularly when it involves exclusive agreements, collusion, or practices that restrict competition. For example, in 2010, the US Supreme Court ruled that the NFL’s exclusive 10-year licensing deal with Reebok was an unlawful conspiracy among the teams to restrict other vendors’ ability to obtain licenses for the teams’ intellectual property. [7] Agreements among teams to set price floors for licensed merchandise or agreements not to license team branding to a specific manufacturer can similarly amount to unlawful price-fixing and boycotting.
Cricket leagues and teams should also be aware of the antitrust risks associated with alleged restraints on players and/or teams, including draft systems, salary caps, free agency restrictions, and franchise relocation rules. While these mechanisms are generally intended to promote the competitive balance within a league, they can be challenged as anticompetitive practices if they limit the ability of players to negotiate their terms freely. The US Supreme Court has determined that league rules imposing duties and restrictions on the conduct of members can violate antitrust laws.
For example, in the 1980s, a federal appellate court struck down an NFL rule that required approval from three-fourths of team owners before a team could move cities. [8] In 2014, various mixed martial arts fighters filed an antitrust claim against the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC), alleging, in part, suppression of fighters’ earnings through exclusionary contracting terms. [9] The UFC ultimately settled the lawsuit in 2024.
As cricket continues to grow and expand in the United States, it is prudent for leagues, teams, and enterprises operating in adjacent spaces to consider the potential antitrust risks associated with their business decisions.
Our firm is uniquely positioned to advise and represent firms operating in this space, given our defense of USA Cricket against a federal antitrust lawsuit in 2020. [10] Our firm’s global talent and reach enable our lawyers to rapidly and effectively assist clients as they grapple with these complex and challenging legal issues.
If you have any questions or would like more information on the issues discussed in this LawFlash, please contact any of the following:
[1] Morgan Lewis Partners Sujal J. Shah, Rishi P. Satia, and Daniel S. Savrin represented USA Cricket and persuaded the court to dismiss the lawsuit. See Anne Cullen, Cricket League Retires Antitrust Suit Over US Bidding Process (May 4, 2020).
[2] Relevent Sports LLC v. US Soccer Fed’n Inc., No. 19-cv-08359 (S.D.N.Y. Sept. 09, 2019).
[3] Fusion Elite All Stars v. Varsity Brands LLC, No. 20-cv-02600 (W.D. Tenn. Aug 13, 2020).
[4] See N. Am. Soccer League LLC v. US Soccer Fed’n Inc., No. 17-cv-05495 (E.D.N.Y. Sept. 19, 2017).
[5] See In re Nat’l Football League’s Sunday Ticket Antitrust Litig., No. 15-ml-02668 (C.D. Cal. June 27, 2024).
[6] See Laumann v. Nat’l Hockey League, No. 12-cv-1817, (S.D.N.Y. July 9, 2015).
[7] See American Needle Inc. v. Nat’l Football League, 560 U.S. 183 (2010).
[8] See Los Angeles Mem’l Coliseum Commi’n v. Nat’l Football League, 726 F.2d 1381 (9th Cir. 1984).
[9] See Le v. Zuffa LLC, No. 14-cv-05484 (N.D. Cal. Dec. 16, 2014).
[10] See Anne Cullen, Cricket League Retires Antitrust Suit Over US Bidding Process (May 4, 2020).