The ECB chief Richard Gould has confirmed that the IPL’s involvement in the Hundred would not affect the participation of Pakistan players in the tournament.
Recently, four IPL teams have bought stakes in the Hundred competition: Mumbai Indians, Lucknow Super Giants, Sunrisers Hyderabad and Delhi Capitals placed the winning bids and bought Oval Invincibles, London Spirit, Northern Superchargers and Southern Brave.
The IPL team owners buying franchises in the tournament, it continued the trend of IPL expanding across the world. IPL teams have stakes in the CPL, SA20 and even the MLC.
The exposure of Pakistan players to IPL owned teams has been limited over the last few years.
Asked about this ahead of the 5th edition of the tournament, the ECB chief executive Gould stressed that, in the Hundred, the involvement of top Pakistan players will not decrease in th next few years.
“We’re aware of that in other regions,” told Richard Gould. “But that won’t be happening here,” he added.
The ECB chief executive also said that while the leage would like to have Indian players in the competition, they understood the BCCI’s firm stand on not allowing contracted cricketers to play outside the country.
Players like Dinesh Karthik and Unmukt Chand have played in franchise leagues outside of India, but they started to explore other T20 leagues after they quit Indian Cricket.
“In terms of availability of Indian players, that is not factored into our plans. The BCCI’s position has been very clear. At some point, we’d love to see Indian players come and play in England.”
“We currently see them, obviously, in bilaterals and actually quite a lot in county cricket. But that’s not something that we have predetermined through this process,” Gould said.
The 5th Hundred is set to start on August 05, with the final scheduled to be played on August 31. The tournament will start on the very next day after the conclusion of India’s 5-match test tour of England.
