Alex Hales

[Nintendo]

Hales has apparently decided to skip the england tour of bangladesh to play in the PSL since it earns him more cash, with that decision having recieved some.... "polarized" responses from a few other sites I frequent. What do ya'll think about this call and hales character in general?

 

[Zinzan]

Enter Burgey......

 

[honestbharani]

My reading (from admittedly afar with just public domain knowledge) of the Bristol incident has left me with a very poor impression of Hales as a person, even more than Stokes. That said, he is free to choose to maximize his earnings as a professional. I have no issues with this, or with ECB deciding not to select him as a response either. These guys have limited career time to make a living, so can't begrudge them maximizing those opportunities.

 

[Nintendo]

My reading (from admittedly afar with just public domain knowledge) of the Bristol incident has left me with a very poor impression of Hales as a person, even more than Stokes. That said, he is free to choose to maximize his earnings as a professional. I have no issues with this, or with ECB deciding not to select him as a response either. These guys have limited career time to make a living, so can't begrudge them maximizing those opportunities.

I don't know how to feel about the bristol incident honestly. It happened 3 years ago, clearly the England management believe hales have served his time and stokes has no obvious issues being in the dressing room with hales again, but the entire way he handled the scenario and the follow-up was despicable.

 

[thierry henry]

Look I’ll give him this, he’s a better bloke than Ben Stokes

 

[ashley bach]

Times have changed and I think it's totally acceptable for players to choose bulk cash over representing their country.
This is only going to go further in one direction in the near future. The 20/20 leagues are a serious business, and eventually more players are going
to follow this path as the lure of large payments will be too difficult for many players to refuse.
Fair enough too because it's the players livelihoods we're dealing with here, and as we all know players only have so much time to make their careers.
But yeah, to put it quite frankly Alex Hales is a ****

 

[Adorable Asshole]

Look I’ll give him this, he’s a better bloke than Ben Stokes

Really? I thought it was the opposite

 

[Socerer 01]

hmm didn’t Root skip on the current odi series of England in a world cup year to play in an absolute tinpot league? where is the same criticism for him? sure Root has more credit in his bank than Hales but the context at present is worse for Root

 

[theegyptian]

hmm didn’t Root skip on the current odi series of England in a world cup year to play in an absolute tinpot league? where is the same criticism for him? sure Root has more credit in his bank than Hales but the context at present is worse for Root

I think the context is that Root had for some time to negotiate some time to play/improve t20 cricket and the ECB have given him some time off now because of his previous loyalty/service. i.e it was with the agreement of the ecb that he missed this series.

Personally I think it's bit stupid he isn't playing these ODIs but so be it.

Hales more has just said he's not available for England for this series, rather than an agreement between the the player and board which seems to have been the case with Root. Even then it doesn't sound like the ECB have blackmarked for Hales for this - as it's put in the telegraph article


'England are highly understanding of the situation and have not put pressure on Hales. Indeed, the national team have become increasingly aware that the franchise circuit now pays more, with a series of cricketers who would have been picked for the Lions - the national second-string - this winter not selected so that they could play in franchise leagues instead.

Rob Key and Mo Bobat, England’s managing director and performance director, have taken a pragmatic, flexible approach to overseas leagues. They recognise that it is unfair to demand that players without the certainty of national contracts lose money to represent their country and that players going back on previously agreed franchise deals could jeopardise their future appeal to sides too.'

Hales won't be back in the ODI side but that was always a longshot having not played any first class cricket since 2017, and 50 over since 2019.

Countries are a bit more open to playing their itinerant players in T20 cricket where the players get good quality cricket in domestic t20 leagues.

 

[Socerer 01]

I think the context is that Root had for some time to negotiate some time to play/improve t20 cricket and the ECB have given him some time off now because of his previous loyalty/service. i.e it was with the agreement of the ecb that he missed this series.

Personally I think it's bit stupid he isn't playing these ODIs but so be it.

Hales more has just said he's not available for England for this series, rather than an agreement between the the player and board which seems to have been the case with Root. Even then it doesn't sound like the ECB have blackmarked for Hales for this - as it's put in the telegraph article


'England are highly understanding of the situation and have not put pressure on Hales. Indeed, the national team have become increasingly aware that the franchise circuit now pays more, with a series of cricketers who would have been picked for the Lions - the national second-string - this winter not selected so that they could play in franchise leagues instead.

Rob Key and Mo Bobat, England’s managing director and performance director, have taken a pragmatic, flexible approach to overseas leagues. They recognise that it is unfair to demand that players without the certainty of national contracts lose money to represent their country and that players going back on previously agreed franchise deals could jeopardise their future appeal to sides too.'

Hales won't be back in the ODI side but that was always a longshot having not played any first class cricket since 2017, and 50 over since 2019.

Countries are a bit more open to playing their itinerant players in T20 cricket where the players get good quality cricket in domestic t20 leagues.

if the ecb are fine with it then fair play, nothing more than media smoke as usual

 

[Molehill]

Worth pointing out that Billings, Vince and Dawson have also made the same decision as Hales. Add to the fact the likes of Brook, Duckett, Stone, Root, Jacks are in NZ whilst Bairstow and Livingstone are still injured, this is going to be severely testing resources.

 

[Burgey]

Enter Burgey......

[with my usual elan and alacrity]

I think he should be watching from a 6x8 foot cell in Pentonville Rd Gaol tbh.

Is anyone really surprised Hales would do this though? If he wants to make himself unavailable for England so be it. But England should respond by making themselves unavailable to him.

 

[GotSpin]

Times have changed and I think it's totally acceptable for players to choose bulk cash over representing their country.
This is only going to go further in one direction in the near future. The 20/20 leagues are a serious business, and eventually more players are going
to follow this path as the lure of large payments will be too difficult for many players to refuse.
Fair enough too because it's the players livelihoods we're dealing with here, and as we all know players only have so much time to make their careers.
But yeah, to put it quite frankly Alex Hales is a ****

Yeah you’re absolutely right that players are essentially free agents, but right now the countries themselves are still using all their resources to produce the players

Not much of a return on investment when players go off to foreign domestic tournaments instead

 

[ashley bach]

Yeah you’re absolutely right that players are essentially free agents, but right now the countries themselves are still using all their resources to produce the players

Not much of a return on investment when players go off to foreign domestic tournaments instead

Yeah certainly contracts etc need to be tightened up, even more so on world cup years.
England appear to have the boundaries set from what I can gather, but much more needs to be done because in the years to come it's going to be all
over the place unless the rules of contract can be patterned out to be much clearer.

 

[GotSpin]

Yeah certainly contracts etc need to be tightened up, even more so on world cup years.
England appear to have the boundaries set from what I can gather, but much more needs to be done because in the years to come it's going to be all
over the place unless the rules of contract can be patterned out to be much clearer.

Yeah I don’t know what the answers are but respective boards pouring investment money into producing players who go off and play in random domestic tournaments - almost with no cut through or exposure back home - will need to be addressed

I suppose the counter argument would be that the ability to earn more money may entice those to pursue a professional path in cricket but it certainly doesn’t encourage more kids to play cricket or help the game at all back home

 

[Socerer 01]

seems like most boards are just trying to get their own private t20 leagues up and running as the answer to this problem

 

[Howe_zat]

Yeah so I'd also like to announce I'm not available for Enland's tour to Bangladesh.

Hales hasn't played anything other than T20 for years. He wasn't getting picked.

 

[SteveNZ]

Looming as the biggest issue for the game in the next few years. It's certainly hit us hard in NZ, in terms of players preferring cash grabs in irrelevant T20 leagues over playing for their country. It's a **** situation that needs rectifying and strong governance at ICC and international Board level.

 

[tooextracool]

Don’t really understand what is so polarizing about this decision. The guy chose cash over a meaningless bilateral series. This is all on the ICC to create context around bilateral series that is rendered even more meaningless by the fact that there isn’t a t20 World Cup for another 1.5 years.

 

[ataraxia]

**** context