Shoot players who take part in IPL, says Heffer
Leading sports writer and free trade advocate, Simon Heffer, today said any England player who earns money participating in the IPL "should be shot". Having recently called for players who feature in any white ball match to be banned from Tests for a year, Heffer today stepped up his campaign to preserve the longest form of the game via what he termed "simple, common sense incentives not to be shot."
Mr Heffer after mistakenly clicking on a YouTube video entitled “Lynnsanity”
After his plan received a mixed reception among fans, Heffer was forced to explain the reasoning behind shooting cricketers: "I read about what happens in the IPL and it sounds absolutely disgusting. If England cricketers want to spend two months in India, they should do so the traditional way, by getting ill and thoroughly demoralised during a Test series, not by making themselves financially secure for life."
When it was put to Heffer that sportsmen using free market economics to make money on the world stage was just the sort Global Britain he and other Brexiters had campaigned for, the media stalwart remained unmoved. "Look, I know we are in a glorious new era of Global Britain, but I want it to be global in the way I like it. Maybe a bit of coronation chicken at tea during a county match and, if absolutely necessary, a pack of Doritos. Not people trading freely in other countries.”
Despite the apparently extreme nature of the proposal, a source at the ECB hinted it hadn't been dismissed entirely out of hand. "Simon's idea seems a bit much, so we're instead contemplating a sort of 'three strikes and your out' rule when it comes to shooting squad members," he said. "So, for example, if a player was the wingman in a boozy bust-up, then, to pluck something out of the air, took illegal drugs then, let's say, selfishly caused T20 World Cup selection difficulties by playing like a god in, for instance, the Big Bash then, yes, execution could be an option."