Cricket's governing bodies must move quickly to close the wage gap in the international game or risk a mass exodus to domestic Twenty20 leagues, the MCC world cricket committee has declared.
Following its annual meeting, held in Sydney on Tuesday and Wednesday, the committee used the contrasting examples of the Bangladesh allrounder Shakib Al Hasan and the England wicketkeeper Jonny Bairstow to highlight the vast discrepancies in player wages around the world. It also discussed the fact that underpaid players will be more susceptible to the lure of corrupt approaches from would-be spot-fixers.
Shakib told the committee, which features the likes of Ricky Ponting, Brendon McCullum and Kumar Sangakkara, that numerous younger Bangladesh players were no longer viewing Test cricket as their goal due to the greater financial security afforded them by T20.
"We'd love to see the ICC get more involved in making sure the money goes where it should go - to players," Ponting said. "It's also about understanding that domestic T20 tournaments are giving players almost an easy out to not represent their country and be remunerated in a better way to play those domestic tournaments. The IPL is a big, powerful beast that has probably been the contributing factor to other T20 tournaments around the world. You can't blame players for playing in tournaments like that, some of the countries we're talking about and the dollars guys are on to go and play in the IPL versus play the whole year for their countries is chalk and cheese.
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