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Auckland: The money for being an itinerant T20 player must be good. Luke Wright hates flying but still does the thousands of air miles required for taking his “smoking” bat from one league to the next.
Wright, whose bottom-handed bludgeon and bustling medium-pacers served England so well in their victory over New Zealand in Auckland the other night, also plays in the Indian Premier League, the Big Bash and the Bangladesh Premier League, outside his commitments for country and county.
Serving those masters entailed taking 38 flights last year. “I hate flying, I’m scared of it,” Wright admitted. , after England made their way to Hamilton by road for the second T20 on Tuesday night.
“I’m not scared enough for it to make me stop though, it’s just that I just can’t relax on flights as I get anxious. I just watch the same movies over and over again.”
Wright loves T20 and is good at it, a combination that probably earns him at least £200,000 over and above his salary from England and Sussex.
He also had the good sense of insisting he was paid up front for the Bangladesh Premier League, a tournament notorious for not being prompt in fulfilling its contractual obligations. “Part of my deal was that I was paid before I played,” Wright said.
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