High-profile domestic twenty/20 tournaments are threatening to lure more and more players away from international cricket unless a solution can been found, New Zealand Cricket chief executive Justin Vaughan says.
Vaughan was in Dunedin yesterday for an NZC regional forum and told the Otago Daily Times the game's biggest challenge was to create a window for tournaments such as the Indian Premier League.
"Internationally, the biggest challenge is getting a cohesive annual calendar together which caters for not only international cricket, but also for some of the domestic cricket around the world," Vaughan said.
"There is still apprehension from some countries about putting in a formal window for the IPL.
But unless you can show the leading players a way in which they can participate in some of those competitions and still play for their country, then more and more of them are going to start weighing it up on a financial basis.
"We can't stick our heads in the sand and think that the IPL is going to go away soon or these other opportunities are going to go away. We have to find a way that we can still retain our leading players."
On the domestic front, the main concern was fitting in all three forms of the game into the summer.
The calendar is becoming increasingly congested with the growth and popularity of twenty/20.
Last summer, 100,000 people got along to watch domestic twenty/20 cricket, crowds which were "unheard of", Vaughan said.
"There is a real commercial potential behind twenty/20 cricket and we need to acknowledge that and work with the major associations, particularly with scheduling, to help them maximise those opportunities."
Some critics have suggested one-day cricket is becoming redundant and could be trimmed to help relieve pressure on the domestic schedule.
However, Vaughan said NZC had no plans to follow the likes of Australia, South Africa and England and make changes to the domestic one-day tournament.
"We are not in any rush to tinker with the 50-over format.
But it will be interesting to see how the experiments in England, Australia and South Africa go.
"Scheduling is a really difficult proposition."
On a lighter note, Vaughan was pleased with the progress at the University Oval.
Part of the former Dunedin Art Gallery will be demolished to allow for the ground's expansion.
Demolition is a few weeks away but work on the sight screens and boundary perimeter has started.
"The work that has already gone on gives you a bit of a taste of what the Oval will look like. Once the part of the art gallery has come down it is really going to make this a tremendous ground to play and watch cricket.
"The nicks to third man won't go for six."
The Oval is out of commission until mid-February.
But there will be one international match staged in the region this summer.
The Black Caps will play Pakistan at the Queenstown Events Centre on January 26.
