There is no chance New Zealand will send a weakened team to Sri Lanka despite some players' reluctance to sign annual contracts, chief executive Justin Vaughan says.
Six leading Blacks Caps have been given until July 24 to return their contracts but Vaughan is confident a resolution will be reached.
Daniel Vettori, Brendon McCullum, Jacob Oram, Ross Taylor, Jesse Ryder and Kyle Mills have delayed signing their contracts for fear the much-anticipated inbound tour by Australia will conflict with the Indian Premier League (IPL) if it drifts into April.
However, Vaughan indicated the planned Australian tour would be fitted in around the IPL.
"The players have until July 24 to decide whether they sign their contracts or not and I'm confident they will," Vaughan said when contacted yesterday.
"While there is no window when international cricket actually stops, we need to ensure that there are as few [scheduling] conflicts as possible.
"We are still figuring out our season schedule and I guess the players are also waiting to hear when the IPL is due to be played.
"In an ideal world, players would be available for international cricket and still be able to play in the IPL.
"That would be the best of both worlds but in some seasons there will need to be some compromises made."
Australia is unable to arrive in New Zealand until late February, and with New Zealand's weather not ideal for cricket in April the tour will have to be crammed into a five-week stretch.
That might mean playing two tests rather than three and reducing the number of limited-over fixtures.
"I see no benefit in having a huge stand-off with our leading players.
"That serves no-one's purposes.
"I believe the players desperately want to play for New Zealand and once we have clarity over when the IPL is going to be played I'm very hopeful this will just resolve itself."
While that is good news for New Zealand's August-September tour of Sri Lanka, the popularity of the IPL raises some interesting questions about where cricket is heading in the future, he said.
"At the moment the smaller countries are more exposed to this type of risk because of the gulf that exists between what players are paid to play international cricket and what they can earn in the IPL.
"There is not such a big gap for the likes of Australia, England or India.
"But I don't think it is an issue they will be immune from in the future."
"The IPL has had extraordinary success and you can't wind back the clock or close your eyes and pretend it is not happening.
"It is happening and it creates a series of issues cricket administrators around the world are going to have to face."
New Zealand Cricket Players Association executive manager Heath Mills was also concerned about the future direction of the game.
He said he would like to see international cricket remain the pinnacle of the sport and suggested the ICC needed to prioritise test cricket.
"It is up to the game's administrators to get a programme in place that benefits all countries but they don't seem capable of doing that at the moment."
Mills said Sri Lanka scrapped its tour of England earlier this year because its players had IPL commitments.
"World cricket needs to address this problem.
"We may be able to sort it this year but what about in the future?"
Mills believes the six Black Caps made a prudent decision to delay signing their contracts because they could not be expected to commit themselves until they knew what they were committing too.
But he also believes once the IPL tournament dates have been fixed the problem will be resolved.
