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Former Australia captain Ricky Ponting believes cricket must come to grips with players choosing domestic Twenty20 competitions over Tests.
The West Indies are likely to have several of their best players including Chris Gayle and young spin bowler Sunil Narine unavailable for the upcoming three-Test series against Australia due to their commitments with the Indian Premier League (IPL).
Gayle’s international exile has continued due to his IPL contract commitments while Narine, the Windies’ most effective bowler in the five-match one-day series last month, is expected to choose a $US700,000 ($A672,000) IPL deal over the Tests.
But Ponting feels that scenario is unavoidable with players earning far more in T20 competitions than they would playing for their countries.
“You can understand the players that are opting out of international cricket to go and play IPL,” he told AAP.
“New Zealand’s a good case study there, they just don’t schedule any international cricket when the IPL’s on for the simple reason they would have lost most of their players to IPL and been left with next to nothing.
“I think there’s something to be learned there.
“A West Indies side without Chris Gayle in it is pretty hard to cop but that’s the modern game and it’ll probably happen more and more with the amount of money that’s being spent in those Twenty20 comps around the world.”
Ponting only played one season of IPL cricket in 2008 and says he decided not to return to prolong his career at the international level.
But he says he has no issue with Michael Clarke signing on with Pune Warriors for the latter stages of this year’s IPL.
“I’m sure he would have weighed up everything before he’d even have considered playing in the IPL,” he said.
“It’s a personal decision for him, doesn’t really matter what everyone else thinks about it. He’s just got to work out what’s best for him and his body as far as his cricket is concerned over the next few years.”
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