Indian cricket’s latest flex has targeted Pat Cummins and other top Australian players by threatening two-year bans if they skip the IPL for any reason other than injury.
Under the new regulation, Cummins’ eye-popping $3.67 million contract to play in the IPL this year would have gone up in smoke because he skipped the 2023 tournament. Mitchell Starc’s record $4.43 million deal would also have been under scrutiny.
Mitchell Starc and Pat Cummins.Credit: Getty
Formalised by the BCCI over the weekend, the change greatly tightens the hold of IPL clubs over their players, protecting their budgets, and makes it far more difficult for Cummins and others to manage their calendars to prioritise Australian duty and major events.
It was pushed unanimously by all IPL franchises at a governing council meeting in July, and has been approved by the Indian board chief Jay Shah in one of his last moves before he takes over as the supremo of world cricket in November. The IPL is played from March to June each year.
The new rule states: “Any [overseas] player who registers for [an] auction and, after getting picked at the auction, makes himself unavailable before the start of the season will get banned from participating in the IPL/IPL auction for two seasons”.
Allowances will only be made for “an injury/medical condition, which will have to be confirmed by the [player’s] home board”. Cricket Australia recently gave head of team performance Ben Oliver a more focused role to concentrate on issues such as player availability for franchise leagues.
Even so, Australia’s prospects of repeating a triumphant 2023, when Cummins’ team won the World Test Championship and the ODI World Cup while also retaining the Ashes, have taken a considerable hit. Players will have a choice of either staying out of the IPL around the next similar year in 2027, or trying to play everything at once.
Australia are also meant to play a 150th anniversary Test match against England at the MCG in March that year, in the middle of the IPL.
While the rule is aimed at a raft of international players, none may be more affected by it than Cummins as a fast bowler and multi-format captain of Australia.
Last year, Cummins was tied to the Kolkata Knight Riders, but withdrew from the IPL, citing a clogged schedule that also featured a Test tour of India, a World Test Championship and Ashes series in England and the ODI World Cup, also in India.
“I’ve made the difficult decision to miss next year’s IPL,” Cummins said on social media at the time. “The international schedule is packed with Tests and ODIs for the next 12 months, so will take some rest ahead of an Ashes series and World Cup.”
Australians sold at the 2024 IPL Auction
- Travis Head – $1.22m to Sunrisers Hyderabad
- Pat Cummins – $3.67m to Sunrisers Hyderabad
- Mitchell Starc – $4.43m to Kolkata Knight Riders
- Spencer Johnson – $1.78 million to Gujarat Titans
- Jhye Richardson – $892,000 to Delhi Capitals
- Ashton Turner – $178,000 to Lucknow Super Giants
With the benefit of the time at home, Cummins led Australia to multiple trophies, culminating in the World Cup victory over India in Ahmedabad in November. Young all-rounder Cameron Green, meanwhile, fetched a $3.15 million pricetag but his performances tailed off as the year wore on.
Cummins was then purchased for a record $3.67 million by Sunrisers Hyderabad at the IPL auction, and took part this year with a much less cluttered assortment of international assignments. As captain, Cummins led Hyderabad to the IPL final, where they were defeated by a Kolkata team that was spearheaded by Mitchell Starc ($4.43 million) in his first IPL stint for years.
Had Cummins skipped last year’s event under the new regulations, he would have faced a two-tournament ban. Such a sanction will be difficult to stomach given the figures involved. With their auction prices last year, Cummins and Starc each earned more money bowling two balls playing franchise cricket than for five days of hard Test match graft in a baggy green.
Numerous other Australian players have withdrawn from the IPL without being injured in recent times. Notably, Adam Zampa elected to spend time at home rather than take part for Rajasthan Royals this year, arguing that he needed a timeout amid international assignments.
“There are several reasons why the IPL wasn’t for me this year,” Zampa told the Willow Talk podcast earlier this year. “I think the most important one was the fact that it’s a World Cup year and I’m completely drained from 2023.
“I did the full IPL last year. Obviously, the World Cup was three months in India as well. So I had the best intentions of trying to play the IPL again this year.
“But once push came to shove, I felt like I just couldn’t really offer the Rajasthan Royals the best version of myself and looking forward to the World Cup, that’s what’s more important to me.”
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