England will be without several star names for the start of their T20 series against New Zealand next month, after they were given the green light to prioritise the latter stages of the Women’s Premier League.
Sophie Ecclestone, Nat Sciver-Brunt, Alice Capsey and Danni Wyatt will all miss the first three games of the five-match series before joining up with the squad ahead of the fourth in Wellington.
Uncapped all-rounder Hollie Armitage and spinner Linsey Smith, who last played for England in 2019, have both been called up for the first three matches, while Tammy Beaumont has finally earned a T20 recall and will be part of the squad throughout the series.
The inaugural edition of the WPL in India last year was considered a major success and several of England’s players have lucrative contracts with IPL-backed franchises. Sciver-Brunt, for instance, has a £320,000 deal with Mumbai Indians that makes her one of the tournament’s highest earners - and one of Britain’s best-paid sportswomen.
This year’s WPL is set to take place from February 23 through to March 17, with the First T20 against New Zealand starting in Dunedin less than 48 hours later.
Captain Heather Knight and seamer Lauren Bell have pulled out of the competition to focus on the New Zealand series, but England have given their blessing for those wishing to take up their WPL stints to join the tour late.
“We’ve talked to every player, that was prior to the [WPL] auction and after the auction, and gave them some options as to what they might like to do,” head coach Jon Lewis explained. “We run a really individualised program, we try and optimise opportunities as best we can for all of our players.
“We explored every option available to us to make sure all our players were available during the New Zealand series but that didn’t quite work out as we would have liked. Yes, there are things that other boards could have done but they’re things that are totally out of our control, to be honest. We’ve had to react to the situation as best we can.”
Lewis is himself head coach of a WPL franchise, UP Warriorz, but will leave the tournament after their final group game on March 11 to travel to New Zealand.
Some of the England players involved could also be knocked out of the tournament by that date should their respective teams fail to reach the playoffs, but Lewis says that naming separate squads for the first and second halves of the T20 series will bring clarity to a complex situation.
"The expectation on players these days to be able to fly 18 hours across the world and then drop in and play a game of cricket is unrealistic,” Lewis added. “If you think about what players are in the WPL, they're very important players to us. We're really keen to make sure they make the most of both the opportunities they have.
“[We want to] make sure that all the players that are in New Zealand with us will get a really fair crack, rather than worrying about Nat Sciver-Brunt getting knocked out [of the WPL] on a day, flying in three days later and taking their position in the team.”
The series will form a key part of England’s build-up towards the autumn’s T20 World Cup in Bangladesh, and is followed by a three-match ODI series, for which a 16-player squad has also been named.
Seamer Mahika Gaur, who made her debut last summer at the age of 17, will skip the tour in order to complete her A-Levels, while Issy Wong and Kate Cross, both of whom have WPL deals, have been left out of the T20 series, though the latter is included in the ODI squad.
“We talked long and hard about those two bowlers in particular in selection, and probably the likelihood is that they would have come and sat on the bench in New Zealand,” Lewis said. "So it was no surprise to me that between us, that was how the decision was made. We hope they go and play a lot of cricket in the WPL.”
