The charismatic former New Zealand cricketer, who turned the fortunes of the England Test team around with skipper Ben Stokes over the past year, has indicated cricket tips would be ‘naive’ if they believed the players would turn down lucrative offers from the T20 league to play for the country.
“At the end of the day, the game is going in a different direction,” McCullum told Sen Radio.
“In recent years there has been a bit of sand around international cricket and we would be completely naïve to think that players would turn down huge sums of money on long-term contracts for much less work in these T20 leagues. because they should be playing international cricket.
“Those days are fast approaching,” said McCullum, who resigned as head coach of the Kolkata Knight Riders IPL team after being offered the job of trial team manager from England.
McCullum felt that the boards will have to find a solution to this delicate problem, as they cannot simply allow their best cricketers to play only in the leagues while giving international cricket a short time.
“So what you have to do is you have to work with those players, you have to work with those leagues and try to ideally allow players to have their cake and eat it too because you want your best players play (international cricket).
“It’s not good enough to say. You know if they don’t want to play international cricket for us then fuck them…we’ll move on and find someone different because as as a spectator, you want to see the best players in the world representing their country,” he said.
“I think you have to work with them and that’s something we will be challenged with.”
There is speculation that year-round domestic T20 league contracts could become a reality which could potentially allow franchises to dictate the terms and McCullum believes the game’s governing bodies should ensure players return to play international matches for their respective countries.
“The thing from our point of view is how do we make sure that when that decision (to play in the T20 leagues for the country) comes that they think about how much time they have spent representing the England Test team” , McCullum said. .
“How much fun they’ve had, how great those experiences that they’ve been able to have in an English jersey are so great that they’re willing to keep putting their yards on and even though it might not be as financially viable. than some of the other leagues.”
(AI Image)
