ECB chief takes a sly dig at Jos Buttler with 'extremely important' remark on England stars' international cricket participation

England players are slowly becoming T20 globetrotters playing T20 cricket all around the world. Players like Alex Hales, and Jason Roy are playing across different T20 cricket leagues and have taken the franchise leagues by storm.

Jos Buttler, Reece Topley, David Willey, and Phil Salt were among the ones who played in the IPL 2024. The likes of Buttler and Salt had to return back to England due to national commitments as Pakistan traveled to England to play a T20I series just before the T20 World Cup.

England and Wales Cricket Board Chief Executive chief executive officer Richard Gould clarified on Monday that while their players are playing across different T20 leagues all over the world, their presence is necessary and important during national commitments. Some felt it was a sly dig at Jos Buttler who demanded an IPL window free of international cricket fixtures.

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In IPL 2024, several franchise owners expressed their dissatisfaction with the ECB calling back their players just before the knockout stages of the tournament. Rajasthan Royals missed Buttler while KKR missed Phil Salt in the knockout stages. Salt for KKR was crucial for the team finishing first in the group stage but the England keeper-batter could not play the final few games for the franchise.

In the end, KKR won their third IPL title and the franchise spoke to Salt on a video call to make him part of the celebrations. He scored over 300 runs for the team.

The ECB chief in an online press conference spoke to the reporters on the importance of the top class players being available for international commitments.

"Look, we are always very pleased when our players go out around the world playing in franchise tournaments. We've a very good record. If you look at 2023, there were 74 English qualified men's players that played in tournaments around the world. That is by far and away, means the biggest contributor to global franchises per annum," Richard Gould said as quoted by TOI.

The second-best performing nation, I think, is Pakistan, with 45. So look, we're always very keen when our players are able to pursue other opportunities, but of course, as you all would've seen, as we've made it clear in our central contracts, it's extremely important that our top players, both men and women are available, able and willing to play for England when we have bilateral or ICC internationals that we are competing in," The ECB boss further added.

There were also talks about the ECB's interest in the attraction of private investment for eight county teams in what would be a completely revamped version of The Hundred for 2025. Vikram Bannerjee, ECB's Director of Business Operation was also present at the event.

In June earlier this year, MCC president Mark Nicholas said that five IPL teams had an interest in acquiring a stake in London Spirit, the Lord's based team participating in The Hundred. Gould and Bannerjee though refrained from speaking directly anything about the issue. Reports said that possible IPL investors will almost have a 50 percent of stake in the teams.

"Broadly speaking, cricket is full of really nice, friendly people and therefore, we've had lots of discussions with lots of clubs, but it's not appropriate for us to make a specific comment on any specific club or any investor in part of this process. That would be unfair to them because the process (of finalizing the investors) doesn't start until September," Gould said.

Meanwhile, England after their exit from the T20 World Cup 2024 is now playing Test series against West Indies. The white-ball side is on a break after the ICC event.