Former England cricketer and current Managing Director of the Men’s cricket team, Rob Key, shed light on the decision-making process that allowed Jofra Archer to participate in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025. Archer, the right-arm fast bowler, was bought by the Rajasthan Royals for an impressive INR 12.5 crore in the mega auction.
A thoughtful approach to Jofra Archer’s workload
Key explained the delicate balancing act between managing Archer’s workload and supporting his career aspirations. Key praised Archer, describing him as “brilliant to deal with.” He mentioned that they mutually agreed it would be best for Archer to skip the IPL 2025 to focus on recovery, build up his workload through Championship cricket, and prepare for the Test summer, a plan Archer was happy with.
“Jofra is always brilliant to deal with,”. ‘We were like, ‘The best thing might be to miss the IPL this year and get yourself ready, and we’ll start building your loads up… if you can get through a bit of Championship cricket, and then you can start the Test summer. He was happy with that,’ Key said in an interview on Wisden Cricket Weekly’s Patreon channel.
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Challenges with IPL regulations
Key explained that they initially hoped to justify the player’s injury by claiming he was under a “managed workload period” according to IPL rules. However, his high-performance bowling, with two slips and a gully at 90mph in T20s in the West Indies, made it difficult to argue that he was injured. This discrepancy undermined their case.
“But we had to look and see what India were going to do with [the IPL’s rules]. We thought that we could make the case that he’s still in part of a managed workload period. The problem with that was he was then bowling with two slips and a gully and bowling 90mph in the T20s in the West Indies, so it’s hard to make the case that he’s injured when he’s bowling like that,” the 45-year-old added.
The former cricketer revealed that after discussions, the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) decided Archer wouldn’t be eligible to play in the IPL this year but could participate from next year onward. Recognizing Archer might lose out on approximately $4 million, Key emphasized it was ultimately spearhead’s decision, as it’s his career and life, and assured him he could still play Test cricket regardless of the choice.
“They [the BCCI] came back after a bit of back-and-forth and said, ‘Well no, he won’t be allowed to go into this year, next year from then on. So then you start thinking that could be about $4 million that he loses out on there, and I don’t then feel… then it’s on him, really. You say, ‘Jof, what do you want to do? This is your career, your life. You’ll still be able to play Test cricket,” the former England cricketer stated.
A balanced outlook for the future
Key added that while they believed there were challenges ahead, they were confident Archer would be fine, albeit slightly delayed in preparation. The right arm bowler later decided to enter the IPL auction and use the tournament to build his workload, aiming to prepare for the Test series through that route, a decision the team fully supported.
“We believe there’s a lot of water to go under the bridge for that, but we still think he’ll be alright. We’ll just be a couple of months behind… So then Jofra decided that he felt the best thing for him was to go into the IPL [auction], which we had no issue with, and then do that loading throughout the IPL and get himself ready for the Test series that way,” Key concluded.
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