Gossip Queen: Royal gamble may deliver big payday for Shane Warne
Cricket great Shane Warne has told Sam Newman that a clever investment that may have been his biggest and smartest gamble could result in a multi-milliondollar payday.
Fiona Byrne
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Spin kingShane Warnehas revealed the multi-milliondollar payday that awaits him after what may have been his biggest and smartest gamble.
The cricket great told Sam Newman’s You Can’t Be Serious podcast that clever negotiations had given him a lucrative investment in the Indian Premier League cricket team, The Rajasthan Royals.
He came out of retirement to play for the Royals in 2008 for a fee of $657,000.
“Part of my deal because I had retired from international cricket and I came out (of retirement), they asked me to be captain, coach and run a cricket team the way I wanted to run it; I was the one-stop shop,” Warne said.
“We were the underdogs, we were the least favoured, no one gave us a chance to win. It was the first ever year of the IPL of franchise cricket where owners bought players and players went into auctions.
“Anyway, we won it.
“I also own 3 per cent of the Rajasthan Royals.
“Part of my negotiation was that for every year I played (he played for four years) I got 0.75 per cent (ownership of the team) and at the moment they are valued at around $200 million.”
He said he hoped the team would be worth $400 million in two years.
“Three per cent of $400 million is all right,” he said.
The Royals’ victory in the first year of the IPL is the basis of a planned movie.