MUMBAI // The English players - Kevin Pietersen, Andrew Flintoff and Owais Shah - along with South Africa's Jean Paul Duminy and Austraia's Michael Clarke are the most in demand as the player auction on Feb 6 in Goa gets closer. With the limit of overseas players increased to 10 for the second season, all the teams are eager to claim the men in form. In the case of Shah, he is being preferred since he will be available for a longer time as he is not part of the Test squad.
Meanwhile, the England and Wales Cricket Board is dithering over putting ink to paper to the contracts of its players. After discussion and deliberations over months on the players' participation in the IPL, the ECB worked out a compromise for a three-week window with the IPL chairman Lalit Modi and on the condition that the minimum commitment will be till 2010. However, the 2010 dates of IPL cannot be finalised now while the ECB has to decide on the players' contracts taking the time frame into consideration.
If the 2010 IPL is played in its usual slot in April-May it will clash with the World Twenty20 in the Caribbean and England's home Test series against Bangladesh. The players have already signed up and asked the ECB to run through the finer details. sports@thenational.ae
