Shivamogga Lions

Shivamogga Lions is a franchise who ply their trade in the Karnataka Premier League competition, organised by the Karnataka State Cricket Association.

The team represents the region of Shivamogga in the Karnataka Premier League. The franchise was founded in 2015 and played for the first time in the fourth season of the competition.

The franchise was founded as Namma Shivamogga but decided to change their name before the 2018 edition of Karnataka Premier League.

Background

The owner of Shivamogga Lions is R. Kumar. The franchise was the eighth franchise to be added to the Karnataka Premier League, back in 2015. Since then, the tournament has remained an eight-team affair and no more franchises have been added to it.

According to the official website of the franchise, the logo represents the franchise’s commitment to give the best towards cricket and cricket lovers. It represents their journey towards reaching the pinnacle of success.

Prominent Achievements

For the first couple of seasons, Shivamogga remained in contention to reach the final phase of the tournament in their final group stage match but ended up on the wrong side of the table.

However, the franchise managed to turn things over in the sixth season in 2017 when they finished third, having same points as Hubli Tigers and Bijapur Bulls.

In the semi-finals, Shivamogga faced Bijapur Bulls. Batting first, Shivamogga made 157/5 in their 20 overs courtesy a late flourish from Shoaib Manager who made 36 off 12 deliveries. In reply, Bijapur reached the target in a nail biting finish with a couple of balls to spare. Bijapur looked in dire straits until Abhimanyu Mithun reached the crease and smashed a 12-ball 32 to take his side to the final.

Career Trajectory of the club

Shivamogga Lions are one of the only three teams not to have lifted the crown at the Karnataka Premier League. Shivamogga were last franchise to be added to the competition and in order to draw fans towards the franchise, the team bought the services of long-time Karnataka players Shreyas Gopal and Stuart Binny. Except these two big names, the side was made up of unknown quantities and value for money players like Abrar Kazi.

In the fifth season, the franchise retained the two big names and also added the services of Pavan Deshpande and KP Appanna. Deshpande was a relatively unknown name back then but he has impressed everyone with his batting abilities since then.

For the following season, the club let go of its big names and roped in Karnataka veteran Balachandra Akhil. Young players like Rongsen Jonathan, Nihal Ullal, Liyan Khan turned out to be great buys as they propelled the side to their first knockout stage appearance.

Shivamogga opted to revamp their side totally for the 2018 edition of the tournament. They retained Aniruddha Joshi, Mohammad Sarfraz Ashraf, Nihal Ullal and Liyan Khan from their previous squad. The franchise then broke all records when they bought Abhimanyu Mithun for some staggering Rs. 8.3 lakhs. However, Mithun has been selected in the Duleep Trophy squad and will miss the Karnataka Premier League. This will be a major blow for the franchise but they have decided not to replace him.