IPL franchises offer 6 English players with multi-million-pound deals to quit international cricket - Reports

Talks also happened with Australian T20 specialists for a hybrid model of IPL deal along with a country contract.

Owners of top IPL franchises have reportedly offered six England players huge multi-million-pound deals to quit international cricket and play for their franchise all year around, the 'Times London' reported.

Notably, the majority of the Indian Premier League (IPL) franchise owners have branched out by buying teams in other T20 leagues as well, including CPL (West Indies), SA T20 (South Africa), Global T20 League (UAE), and the upcoming Major League T20 in the US.

The report, however, doesn't state which are franchises that have approached and who are the players involved in the discussion.

'The Times' report quotes: "Initial discussions have taken place after at least six English players, including some international stars, were approached by IPL franchise owners and asked whether, in principle, they would accept a deal that would make an Indian team their main employer, rather than the ECB or an English county."

This development reportedly comes after discussions among players' unions around the world about the potential implications of 12-month franchise contracts, which would be a noteworthy step towards the football model of elite players being primarily contracted to their team and released for international duty, rather than the other way around.

Similar talks with Australia T20 star also underway

ICC has always thought about putting a cap on the number of leagues that an active contracted player can take part in a year, but there is a possibility of a young player retiring from international cricket or going the franchise cricket way to become free agent.

"The probability of such a model being adopted has grown increasingly likely in recent years as some IPL franchise owners have bought stakes in several T20 tournaments in the UAE, South Africa, Caribbean — and now the United States with the new Major League Cricket venture which begins in July," the newspaper reported.

The paper also claimed that a discussion on similar lines took place with star Australian T20 specialists also.

It read: "Discussions have already taken place with a number of high-profile Australian players about full-time deals but this has now been extended to English players. Contracts could be worth upwards of GBP 2 million a year and even as high as GBP 5 million — more than five times the value of the highest England central contracts."

There have been talks of partial IPL contracts, partial ECB, or county deals, especially for players who only play white-ball cricket.

"Reduced IPL deals — covering at least three of the rounds — would also be on offer. It is unlikely that any of England's Test stars will walk away from their central contracts in favor of a franchise contract but the sheer amount of money on offer makes that a risk in the future. What is more likely is that players will arrange "bespoke" deals depending on their own circumstances, which could result in them being part-contracted to their county or the ECB and part-contracted to a franchise,” the Report concluded.