By Rico
More good news coming in for Zee Group-backed Indian Cricket League (ICL) with former New Zealand Test and one-day stars Nathan Astle and Chris Cairns having been targeted to sign with ICL.
New Zealand Cricket Players Association (NZCPA) has also given green signal to their cricketers willing to play in ICL, provided they do not cut across their contractual obligations with New Zealand Cricket Board (NZC).
Amid reports of Dean Jones luring over some big Kiwi stars for ICL, NZCPA manager Heather Mills said all the players who will be on New Zealand Cricket (NZC) contracts would be free to play in Subhas Chopra's ambitious cricket leauge, provided they seek a clearance from NZC, which he said could not be unreasonably
withheld.
withheld.
He considers players as individual contractors, not employees, so as long as a cricketer is able to fulfil his obligations to NZC he can go and play for another entity.
He gave example of Stephen Fleming and Scott Styris, who will be playing county cricket in England when their new NZC contracts kick in.
He meant to say that New Zealand players who have national contracts with NZC can play for ICL when they are not doing national duties. This is surely good news for ICL though no currently NZC contracted player has been approached so far.
However, the NZC is unlikely to grant temporary releases to the contracted players this year because of their packed international calendar, which includes the innaugural Twenty20 World Cup in South Africa in September followed by a month-long South Africa tour from November 9 till December 2.
Images: cricketfundas.com; in.rediff.com
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