McCullum on cricket's future: 'Naive to think players will turn down huge money in T20 leagues'

With the rise of T20 franchise leagues, cricket as a sport has seen a big surge in lucrative offers for players around the world. There have also been instances when players have decided to prioritise their franchises over their respective national teams.

Former New Zealand cricketer Brendon McCullum feels that the sport is reaching a point where many players could prefer these lucrative T20 leagues over international duty, due to the presence of huge sums of money. With IPL considered to be the richest T20 league in the world, there has been a surge in finances in competitions in countries like Australia, Pakistan and Bangladesh.

Speaking to Sen Radio, McCullum stated that the game is going in a 'different direction' and players won't turm down long-term contracts for less work in T20 leagues. "In the end, the game is going in a different direction", he said.

"The last few years, there's been a shifting of the sand somewhat around international cricket and we'd be completely naive to think that players would turn down huge amounts of money on long-term contracts for a lot less work in these T20 leagues because they should be playing international cricket. Those days are fast approaching to be over", he further added.

McCullum's advice for cricket boards is that they need to find a middle point with such franchise leagues, so that their best players can play international matches. "So, what you've got to do is you've got to work with these players, you got to work with these leagues and try and allow ideally players to have their cake and eat it too because you want your best players playing (international cricket). It's not good enough to say. You know what if they don't want to play international cricket for us, then bugger them... we'll move on and find someone different because as a spectator, you want to see the best players in the world representing their countries", he said.

McCullum is currently England's Test head coach, which he took over after stepping down from his role with Kolkata Knight Riders in the IPL. Talking about franchise leagues, currently IPL 2023 is taking place and the presence of some international fixtures has already created a sense of irritation among fans.