England seamer Chris Woakes has explained the reasoning behind withdrawing from this year's Indian Premier League.
Woakes was purchased by the Delhi Capitals at the player auction late last year, but won't participate in the 2020 IPL – and instead focus on prolonging a solid international career. Delhi are priced at 7.00 by bet365 to win the 2020 IPL.
“I want to play for England as long as possible – that's still the pinnacle for me. I just feel like I'd been on a bit of a treadmill and I needed to get off for a bit of a breather. From a mental point of view it's about recharging those batteries,” said Woakes.
“The IPL is great but I've been there and done it. That's not to say I don't want to do it again but at this moment England is the most important thing to me, as well as spending time at home with the family where I can.
“You don't put yourself into these things intending to pull out. I went into the IPL auction hoping that I would get picked up, it's a great experience. But it's impossible to do everything.
“International cricket can be draining at the best of times because there's so much pressure on you to perform. There's always people knocking on the door and to stay on top of your game all year round is hard. The schedule has just got busier and busier – the only breaks you really get in international cricket are at IPL time.”
England at the 2020 T20 World Cup
The 31-year-old Woakes has only played nine T20Is in as many years – and arguably isn't in contention for a berth in England‘s squad for the T20 World Cup in Australia later this year.
“If I felt like I had real good opportunity to be in that T20 squad I'd probably still go to the IPL and try to produce some good form. The selectors know what I'm about and what I can do but realistically it'd probably take a few injuries for me to be in contention,” he added.
“I suppose I don't know the answer to why that happened. I think it happened gradually. The 50-over World Cup was prioritised, which was right, and during that period I was rested during a lot of T20 series.”