England’s cricket managing director Ashley Giles has confirmed that the English players will not be released to participate in the second half of the Indian Premier League 2021. The IPL 2021 is expected to resume from the third week of September in the UAE.
However, England will be touring Bangladesh and Pakistan during the same window. Giles confirmed that the England players could be rested for these two tours to be fresh for the T20 World Cup and the Ashes but they won’t be allowed to take part in the IPL 2021.
“We have a full schedule if we go from the end of the fifth Test in September. We are set to leave for Bangladesh in the next couple of days. We have a full schedule right through, including Pakistan and wherever the T20 World Cup is,” said Giles.
“We are going to have to give some of these guys a break at some point. But the intention of giving guys a break for, say, Bangladesh wouldn’t be for them to go and play cricket elsewhere.
“We have to manage our schedule now, so we get our guys arriving in the best shape possible for the T20 World Cup and Ashes,” said Giles.
Meanwhile, it was earlier reported that the BCCI had requested the ECB to prepone the five-match Test series to have a larger window for the IPL. In fact, it was rumoured that the Indian board wanted to cancel one Test match against England to have a bigger window for the IPL. However, both of these reports were squashed by BCCI and ECB.
12 England players are part of the IPL and it would be a big blow if they aren’t able to take part in the tourney. There are big players like Eoin Morgan, Jos Buttler, Sam Curran, Jofra Archer and Ben Stokes and the IPL will definitely lack interest without these players.
