Killer Jeans has replaced Mobile Premier League (MPL) as the official kit sponsor of Team India. The Indian team will be officially donning their new kit with effect from the first T20I against Sri Lanka that will be played at Mumbai’s Wankhede Stadium on Tuesday, January 3.

MPL Sports has decided to transfer their kit and merchandise rights to a third party named Kewal Kiran Clothing Limited (KKCL) for the remainder of their contract. KKCL is the owner of some of the well-known brands like Killer Jeans and Lawman PG3.

The Indian players including the likes of Yuzvendra Chahal, Arshdeep Singh, Mukesh Kumar, Ruturaj Gaikwad and Umran Malik were seen posing for a photograph ahead of the home series against Sri Lanka and in that picture posted by Chahal on his official Twitter handle, they all were spotted donning the jerseys with the KKCL chest logos.

Notably, the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) during the Apex Council meeting had made it clear that no sponsorship rights are supposed to be transferred to any another brand till March this year. Nonetheless, MPL seems to have exited the deal due to unknown reasons.

Apart from MPL, the BCCI has also lost two of its main sponsors in the last few months. Digital payments and financial services company Paytm backed out and transferred the domestic rights to Mastercard while it has been learned that popular educational technology app Byju’s is also ending its sponsorship ties with the cricket board before the end of its contract.

In November 2020, MPL had signed a three-year contract with the BCCI until December 31, 2023 after replacing Nike. However, it seems that the post effects of the COVID-19 pandemic has left them with no choice other than backing out of this phenomenal deal.

The new-age start-ups are adversely impacted by funding crunch and MPL was also one of the severely impacted firms as they had to downsize their workforce in 2022 due to funding crunch.