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       MELBOURNE: Engl-a-nd and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) chief executive Richard Gould said they would not support a proposed global Twenty20 league bankrolled by Saudi Arabia as there was not enough room in the calendar for it.

       A Sydney Morning Herald report on Saturday said the event would be backed by the sports arm of Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund and feature eight teams playing in four different locations.

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       “With the busy international calendar, a host of established franchise leagues around the world, and existing concerns about player workloads, there is no scope or demand for such an idea,” Gould told the same newspaper. “It’s not something that we would support.”

       The ECB is keen to protect its own 100-ball format league, The Hundred, having raised $1.27 billion last month after selling franchise stakes to private investors.

       The Indian Premier League remains the benchmark in franchise cricket, while Australia, Pakistan, West Indies, South Africa and the United Arab Emirates also have their own T20 leagues.

       The Australian Cricke-ters Association has bac-k-ed the proposed league saying it was mandated to “pursue initiatives that benefit our members”.

       “The ACA’s early interest in exploring this concept is motivated by a desire to develop and normalise best-practice collective bargaining and an inte-rnational gender-equity pay model for male and fe-m-ale cricketers,” the pla-yer’s union was quoted as saying in the report.

       Published in Dawn, March 19th, 2025