Australia selector George Bailey has warned that several players might pull out of the Pakistan series, to play the Indian Premier League.
Australia’s tour of Pakistan is scheduled to begin on March 3 and will run till the first week of April. It could be clashing with the early days of the IPL which is reported to begin its proceedings on the final days of March.
With the white-ball series slotted in the later half of the series, chief selector Bailey has feared that the multi-format players might want to exit the national team early to get to play in the IPL, which offers them a lot of money.
"It's tough for the multi-format guys to work out that balance of where do they get time to physically replenish their energy reserves, particularly for fast bowlers," Bailey said.
"To make sure they are fit, strong and able to deal with the workload. But that's part and parcel of a modern cricketer's life. It (the IPL) continues to be a tournament that offers a huge amount to players.
Several Australian players could get a big price in the mega-auction after their tremendous ICC T20 World Cup campaign and could slot in as the star players of their individual team.
"From a learning perspective and I don't think the monetary side of things can be discounted ... for a reasonably brief period of work, the paydays are pretty enormous for a certain percentage of them."
It could be easily assumed that players like David Warner, Mitchell Marsh, Pat Cummins might be in for a big pay day in the mega-auctions, slated to be held in the second week of February.