Maxwell to miss Pakistan tour due to his wedding

SYDNEY: Australia’s Glenn Maxwell has confirmed he will miss the Pakistan tour, and will likely miss the start of the IPL, due to his upcoming wedding, while Kane Richardson has pondered whether he and Adam Zampa may have damaged their reputations with IPL owners after leaving the tournament early last year.

Maxwell, who is in the frame to captain Royal Challengers Bangalore this season, had flagged publicly after the T20 World Cup in November last year that he would miss the Pakistan tour due to his wedding in late March.

But given the early start to the IPL season, it means David Warner, Mitchell Marsh, Pat Cummins, Marcus Stoinis, Josh Hazlewood, Matthew Wade and Daniel Sams are all likely to be unavailable due to Australia duty in Pakistan, with the final T20I to be played on April 5.

Maxwell will also still be in Melbourne due to his upcoming wedding. He explained to the host broadcaster Fox Cricket the third T20I against Sri Lanka in Canberra that the clash was unavoidable due to the constant schedule changes, despite consulting Cricket Australia.

“Originally when I organised the dates with CA there was a two-week gap where I could potentially have it,” Maxwell said. “So when I sorted that out I was pretty happy that I wasn’t going to be missing in any series. And then I came to the [CA] contract meeting midway through last year and they said well this is [when] the Pakistan series [is on] and I thought well obviously that’s changed since the last conversation we had.”

Meanwhile, Richardson, who was Player of the Match in Canberra after taking 3 for 21, spoke candidly about not being bought at the IPL auction.

Richardson was not surprised he wasn’t picked up but eyebrows were raised about Zampa being left unsold after his outstanding T20 World Cup. Richardson wondered whether the decision by the pair to leave the IPL early last year just prior to the tournament’s postponement due to Covid-19 might have had an impact.

“I was definitely more shocked for him,” Richardson said. “To be brutally honest, when we left last year, in the circumstances early, I remember having a conversation with him. I said to him, look, this may come back and bite us, and at that time it wasn’t a priority for us to be there. We wanted to get back to Australia.