England stands no chance in next year's Twenty20 World Cup in the West Indies if their players are not allowed to play in the Indian Premier League (IPL) next season, believes former captain Michael Vaughan.
"We should be making our players available for the whole of the IPL window. We are not great at Twenty20 cricket. We've got a Twenty20 World Cup in May and at the minute we've got no chance," Vaughan said.
"If it was my England team I'd be looking at the first-team players and thinking that I want them to experience playing in those IPL games, I'd want to have them playing in those packed stadiums and picking the brains of all those great players. That will give us a better chance of winning the Twenty20 World Cup," Vaughan was quoted as saying by The Guardian.
Asserting that IPL would do a world of good to the English players, Vaughan said, "We have to give our players as much opportunity as possible to try and win a trophy. England should take the guys who could do with a rest from Test cricket and send them to play in the IPL to develop their Twenty20 skills."
Vaughan's argument notwithstanding, English players' participation in the third IPL would be restricted from March 12 to April 25 because the cash-rich event clashes with their tour to Bangladesh.
Vaughan went on to the extent of saying that key players should skip the Bangladesh tour and compete in IPL.
"I don't have any quibble with senior players missing the Bangladesh tour. That tour is not going to be about developing the team for the Ashes. This winter will be about developing a side for the Ashes. Bangladesh is a very different kind of cricket," Vaughan said.
"Sending players to the IPL would produce a few good performances and help develop a good network of players to come back and play for us in the Twenty20. One thing our Twenty20 players don't have is experience," he added.
Besides Kevin Pietersen, Andrew Flintoff and Paul Collingwood, who are contracted with IPL teams, Vaughan thinks England should also allow players like Stuart Broad, Graeme Swann and James Anderson to get the exposure to the shortest version of cricket.
