Sheffield Sharks welcome salary cap abolition in basketball even if it means London Lions are uncatchable

The new BBL season tips off on Friday when the Sharks welcome London Lions to a sold-out Ponds Forge for a game to be televised live on Sky Sports.

The game marks the first full season of investment into the BBL from American financiers 777 Partners, who bought a 45 per cent stake in the league and pumped £7m in last December.

One of the major changes they have implemented is abolishing the salary cap, the immediate benefactors of which are the Lions, who are already owned by 777 Partners.

Lions now operate on a playing budget of £2m a year, a figure they need as a minimum requirement to enter and compete as Britain’s representative in Europe’s elite competition this season.

The budget of the Sharks and the majority of the 10 teams in the league is about one-eighth in comparison, meaning Lions are huge favourites to scoop their fair share of the four trophies on offer this term. But both Sharks head coach Atiba Lyons and club owner Yuri Matischen, who sits on the BBL board, know there is something bigger at stake than their own team succeeding.

"We’ve tried the process of incrementalism,” says Matischen, who has been involved in British basketball for three decades.

"You can do your little bit by investing a little here and there, but what you find is you’re going backwards.

"What you need is huge investment, huge vision and to go big. We’ve spent 30 years trying to do it carefully and within ourselves and it doesn’t work. We cannot break out of the paper bag, so we have to invest big.

"So we either restrict our lead franchise from playing because we all want to be competitive locally, or we say to the Lions you go for it, go and showcase British basketball at the highest level, attract the best British players and then let’s see what impact we have on our game as a consequence.

"We didn’t just scrap the salary cap, it was a strategic plan. We want London to succeed and reflect back on us.

"This has been thought through. They’re going to go and compete at the highest level of Europe, attract more players, attract more interest. We’re not happy to just sit here and say the league got another £1,000 and another spectator – it’s going from here to another level. It’s transformational, and that’s what we need to be.”

The ambition is that Lions stride ahead and the rest latch on to the coat-tails.

Sheffield will be in a position to benefit over the long-term because after years of saving and lobbying, they will finally move into their own arena next season.

A 2,500-seater venue is being built as part of a medical diagnostic centre from Canon Medical Systems on the Olympic Legacy Park in Attercliffe. The basketball side of it will be run by the Sharks.

"It’s inspiring,” said Matischen, who has worked long and hard to bring an arena to reality. "People are seeing and believing now.”

For Lyons, assembling a roster capable of competing with the big-spending Londoners has been aided by bringing back a number of last season’s starts like Jordan Ratinho, Kipper Nichols and new captain Rodney Glasgow Jnr.

"The importance for us of having a returning core gives us that continuity in gametime, which will bode well for us against some of the teams that might have gone above and beyond,” he said.

"For us we’re not at that level where we’re worried about spending too much, but hopefully in years to come we will be chasing London in terms of budget.

"The salary cap is all about teamwork, it’s a team game, and we’ll put the strongest team together we can.

"I think it’s good for the sport, the BBL is in a place where the sport globally is taking off. There are juggernauts in every other basketball country in the world and the BBL is the last to the party, so hopefully eliminating that salary cap and London going out to be the forgers - I’m all for it. We just have to keep working hard to grow the clubs who are chasing them.”