Back in July Indian legend Sunil Gavaskar joined the long-standing debate over players choosing the IPL over representing their country.
Gavaskar, a member of the IPL’s governing council, said while delivering the Dilip Sardesai Memorial Lecture in Mumbai. “The IPL could not be the ultimate goal for players and pointed out the worrying trend among young cricketers to pull out of domestic matches in order to be injury-free ahead of the tournament. “That is what we have to be very careful about, the IPL being seen as the be all and end all, not the India cap,” he said.
With Andrew Flintoff recently turning down an England contract to become the worlds first freelance cricketer, how many more players will be following in his footsteps and choosing to play twenty20 cricket all over the world, instead of fulfilling an international career with their birth or adopted nation. Flintoff quit Test cricket to concentrate on playing in domestic twenty20 leagues to earn vast sums of money. It is as simple as that. The question is, do you think it was right or wrong?
On the other side of the coin, look at it from Flintoff’s point of view. Having played in only one IPL tournament he has yet to really enjoy the vast sums of money available to him and with his fitness a constant concern and a jeopardy to his future earning potential, who could blame Freddie for believing that it is time to earn himself a healthy retirement fund knowing that in a few years time his body might not be in the right state to allow him to play cricket at all. So answer the question again. Was Flintoff right to choose club over country in this situation?
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