The England and Wales Cricket Board should bring on board the BCCI as a “minority ownership partner” of The Hundred in order to attract Indian players to the tournament, Lancashire CEO Daniel Gidney has said, according to a report. Even though Indian men’s players are not issued ‘No Objection Certificates’ to play outside the IPL, the T20 league owners have expanded their footprint across the globe, and have stakes in SA20 (South Africa), ILT20 (UAE) and Major League Cricket (USA). According to ESPNCricinfo, Gidney believes “aligning interests” would be the way to bring Indian players to compete in The Hundred.

“I think it’s possible. If I was the ECB, I’d be talking about perhaps bringing the BCCI in as a minority ownership partner in the tournament as a whole. If you do that, then you are aligning interests,” he said.

While Indian men’s players feature only in the IPL, the country’s women cricketers, including captain Harmanpreet Kaur and Smriti Mandhana, have featured in England’s The Hundred and Australia’s Women’s Big Bash League.

“That is probably your best chance of getting (Indian) players in The Hundred. It comes down to the will, and the individuals on both sides,” Gidney said.

“The BCCI have been really successful with protecting their brand and by making sure they don’t plan any T20 tournaments anywhere in the world… “If I was the BCCI, then I would have to say I would need a significant incentive to relax the current policy because that has been extraordinarily successful and has grown the IPL into the massive commercial entity that it is,” he said.

The report added that the Lancashire CEO was in India recently to finalise a deal with RPSG Group, which will see them acquire a 70 per cent stake in the Manchester Originals and run the franchise as a joint venture.

Gidney also cited the ties between Lancashire and Indian players to make his point.

“We’ve probably had more Indian overseas players than any other county. When you have VVS Laxman at the NCA, who Mark Chilton (Lancashire director of cricket) captained, then you have strong relationships all the way through,” he said.

“If you build a relationship with the BCCI and understand the types of players that they see as potential future Test players, that’s a lot easier than putting in an NOC request saying, ‘We’d like to see Virat Kohli or Rishabh Pant playing in the County Championship’,” he added.

To start with, Gidney proposed the hosting of exhibition matches.

“Imagine having an LSG (Lucknow Super Giants) vs Delhi Capitals game here at Old Trafford — at the end of the season, say in September. That could be pretty mega, in terms of the Indian fans in the UK. It would make commercial sense for everybody,” he said.

Additionally, the Manchester Originals have used their links with the Super Giants group to sign Afghanistan’s Noor Ahmad and South Africa’s Heinrich Klaasen, who play for the Durban Super Giants in SA20.

“When an overseas player gets bought at auction in the IPL, and that’s locked in for three years via retentions, then it just makes commercial sense for that player to then potentially play for Durban, for Manchester, and also potentially for Lancashire in the (T20) Blast,” he said.

“It’s a lot more efficient, and it could become a lot more straightforward,” Gidney added.

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