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England cricketers hoping for an invite to next season's Indian Premier League will have to relinquish their central contracts if they want to play a full part and take advantage of the riches on offer.
Hugh Morris, the managing director of the England team, said the England and Wales Cricket Board's Test and one-day programme would not be altered to accommodate players wanting to spend more than two weeks at the IPL.
"We will be playing test matches in the early part of May and clearly that will have an impact on the amount of time that players may or may not go to IPL," Morris said. "My understanding is that the International Cricket Council, IPL and the ECB have made it very clear from the word go that international cricket takes precedence over domestic tournaments and I think that will be the case. That's the very
clear message we get from ICC. I understand that is what IPL think as well."
The ECB added the May tests to their programme in 2000, a move that boosted the value of their TV deal, currently with Sky. The broadcaster also paid 330 million for the new four-year deal that begins after next year's Ashes.
To cancel those two tests, ECB would have to pay 5 million per match compensation to Sky while also losing out on the 10-15 million that each match generates, a potentially ruinous prospect.
Players and their agents have their eyes on the money, more so now after England's Stanford bonanza morphed into The Weakest Link. This year's central contracts with the ECB are still to be signed but if there is an impasse between players and Board, only agents with brazen self-interest are promoting one.
"I think we've made it very clear that we are very happy for the players to have a window of opportunity for the players to play in the IPL," said Morris. "Last year at the IPL, the Australians were only there for 25 per cent of the time because they had a test series in the West Indies."
To play in the IPL, players need No Objection Certificates from their respective boards. Mindful of the hectic international itinerary, ECB had said they would leave the decision over them to the coach Peter Moores.
But with the Board keen to get India's elite players over for their own Twenty20 League in 2010, deciding which of England's players can and cannot go has passed to executive level, with Morris,
David Collier and Giles Clarke all able to overrule Moores' recommendations.
"Peter makes a recommendation to me and that goes to the board," said Morris.
