Calcutta: Andy Flower, the stand-in director of England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB), has said that allowing England players to participate in the IPL can result in them missing out on "growth opportunities" in first-class cricket.
Flower, who is standing in for Andrew Strauss as England team director, accepted that though same players benefit from opportunities in other areas, the domestic cricket in England must offer them conditions on a par to international cricket if England's results are to improve.
Flower will also sit in on selection meetings and take over Strauss's role on the domestic structure review working party.
During Flower's tenure as England coach, there was tension between the players wanting to participate in the IPL - notably Kevin Pietersen - and Flower's stance that they might compromise their Test form if they spent the early weeks of the County season playing T20 cricket in India.
Under Strauss, however, the ECB's stand changed.
As many as 12 England players, including Ben Stokes, Chris Woakes and Jos Buttler, featured in this year's IPL.
"The ECB position, at the moment, is to allow some of our best players to go to the IPL. And a lot of people will say things have thankfully moved on from the time I made my decisions around subjects like the IPL," Flower told espncricinfo.
Flower said: "(By playing in the IPL) They do miss out on some really excellent growth opportunities in first-class cricket for their Counties. There is no doubt about that. But the understanding at the moment is that they are growing in other ways, playing under a lot of pressure, in front of big crowds and among some of the best players in the world at the IPL."
Flower accepted there would be a window for the 100-ball meet in the new domestic schedule.
"We want to, ideally, recreate international conditions in our domestic cricket," he said. "If you have proper international conditions, there's an imperative for fast bowling rather than the little seamers that dominate the [County] game and good quality spin bowling. You get the consequent benefit of batsmen facing that bowling.
"There is a review of the structure and that might change. That window - for T20 cricket - is five weeks from the last week of July. There's a lot of great cricketing time either side of it. And it's about what they play up to that last week in July. Those decisions are yet to be made."And, when reviewing the domestic structure, the Lions has to be very much a big part of that decision. Yes, the ECB spend a reasonable amount of money in Lions and Young Lions [Under-19] programmes. What we try to do there is provide some added value experiences that the Counties can't provide in their first-class structure.
"We try and put the players in alien conditions, against really good opposition most of the time and almost mirroring some long, tough overseas tours.
"But I think it would be fair to say we haven't done that well enough because we aren't getting those away results. We have to review how we're doing things and be creative and curious about the way we lead those programmes. And about how we coach and how we help these guys quicker and deeper: about themselves and about the game."
