New Delhi: Former Indian captain and BCCI President Sourav Ganguly has revealed that India’s head coach Rahul Dravid will start picking players for the T20 World Cup from the upcoming three-match T20I series against England.

Team India is currently playing a five-match T20I series against South Africa on the home turf. The players will then fly to Ireland and England to play further T20I matches before the upcoming World Cup in Australia.

Some top names including captain Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli and Jasprit Bumrah are not playing in the ongoing series but they are all likely to return for the T20I series in England. Now, Ganguly has also hinted that they will start picking players for the World Cup from the English tour.

“Rahul Dravid (Team India head coach) is looking into it. He has been planning to play a settled set of players at some stage. Probably from the England tour next month, we will start playing with players who are likely to play in the T20 World Cup in October,” Ganguly told The Times of India when asked whether it is ideal to rotate players in the year of an ICC event.

BCCI recently mopped up a huge amount of money from the media rights auction of the Indian Premier League (IPL) which raised speculations about expanding the window for the tournament. The BCCI President also spoke on this issue, he stated, “Bilateral tours will continue. The IPL is an Indian tournament. Bilateral tours are for the rest of the world to generate revenue. Players from other countries need bilateral series. For the next two years, IPL will continue to have 74 matches. The next Future Tours Programme (FTP) cycle will have to be carefully worked out.”

IPL’s per match valuation exceeded that of the English Premier League (EPL). It also raised concerns about whether players will now prefer to play in the IPL more than India due to more money.

Ganguly seemed relieved on this matter and remarked that playing for the nation is a matter of pride and it can’t be compared with money.

“First thing first, money can’t be related to performances. From the times of Sunil Gavaskar to Anil Kumble and Rahul Dravid, the money was nowhere close to what the players get now. But all of them had the hunger to perform. I don’t think players will only play for the money. Players play for the stature they get and the pride of representing India. Every player would want to win big international tournaments,” he concluded.