With Ricky Ponting almost certainly missing this year’s Indian Premier League (IPL) matches, Lalit Modi, Chairman of the IPL seems now to be giving some indication that the big ticket international cricket players may be missed. Although Modi has gone on record in the cricket news earlier as saying Ponting will not be missed, it could be that he now fears that if other foreign players are also absent, this year’s IPL may become a less glittering and attractive affair.

So the latest cricket news and headlines made by Modi with regard to the IPL are in connection with English player Andrew Flintoff. Modi has conveyed to the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) that if Flintoff was to decide that he is fit enough to play in the IPL this year, the ECB should not “interfere”. "It's between the player and his team. It is nothing to do with the ECB as far as we are concerned," Modi was reported as having said. He however added that if the domestic governing body were to invoke clauses in the all-rounder's contract relating to injury, the IPL executive would stand aside.

Flintoff is declared unfit for the fourth test against the West Indies in the current English tour because of a hip injury. It will now remain to be seen whether he will be fit for the fifth test in Trinidad. Flintoff is confident of being fit in time for the upcoming one day series that begins on 20th of March.

However then Flintoff expressed confidence about playing in the IPL which begins in April, ECB chairman Giles Clarke instantly expressed ‘concern’ at this.  He was quoted in the cricket news as saying he was "deeply worried about Andrew Flintoff going to India. It is a definite risk. In any event, the injury he's currently suffering from may not be sufficiently mended for him to go anyway". He indicated that he would have no hesitation in telling Flintoff that IPL was out of bounds if required to do so since as he said, "I think everybody knows I'm capable of doing that if that is what the cricket management require."

It was these sentiments expressed by the ECB chairman that prompted IPL Chairman Modi to call upon the ECB not to ‘interfere’. Although Modi has said that injury of a foreign player does not matter since as he said, "Players get injured all the time. That's why there are seven foreign players in all of the teams," it appears that the absence of a highly paid star like Flintoff will be a major setback which Modi seems keen to avoid.

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3.25 Copyright (C) 2007 Alain Georgette / Copyright (C) 2006 Frantisek Hliva. All rights reserved."

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