Foreign players commit to next 3 IPL seasons fully

Players from Afghanistan, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, the West Indies, and Zimbabwe have committed to being fully available for all three seasons of the Indian Premier League (IPL) in the current cycle (2025-2027). All centrally contracted players from England are also set to participate throughout the three seasons. However, there remain some uncertainties regarding the availability of a few Sri Lankan players and a few Australians, who will feature in the 150-year commemorative Test against England in 2027.

With the exception of Shakib Al Hasan, Bangladesh players will have sporadic availability. Shakib, however, has confirmed his commitment to playing in all matches across all three seasons. The Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) has notified this to the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI).

A key highlight of the foreign player availability list, shared with the franchises by the BCCI on Friday, is the inclusion of all centrally contracted England players, including Harry Brook. Along with Brook, players such as Jofra Archer, Gus Atkinson, Jonny Bairstow, Jacob Bethell, Jos Buttler, Brydon Carse, Zak Crawley, Sam Curran, Ben Duckett, Will Jacks, Liam Livingstone, Ollie Pope, Matthew Potts, Adil Rashid, Phil Salt, Olly Stone, and Reece Topley will be available for all matches throughout the cycle, as confirmed by the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) to the BCCI.

The detailed ECB list is a course correction of the last season when it had pulled out its players before the start of the business end of the league sparking all-round criticism, including from its own players. Besides, the BCCI said, "ECB's non centrally contracted players are available for the next three seasons of the IPL. Some players will be out of contract in this period but within their current contracts they are available."

The odd exceptions from the above mentioned countries are limited availability of certain players for the upcoming 2025 season. They are Matthew Short (Australia, 50% of the 2025 season), Nandre Burger (75%), Dion Myres (Zimbabwe, 85%), Mark Chapman (New Zealand, 55%), Rilee Rossouw (South Africa, 50%) and Will Young (England 50%).

Sri Lankan Cricket (SLC) has said availability of some of its players for the 2026 and 2027 seasons will be confirmed later. "Sri Lanka: Full Availability of players for IPL 2025. Players who are retained for IPL 2026 and IPL 2027 will have full availability, while availability of the players who are released prior to IPL 2026 and IPL 2027 will be informed before the auction of that particular season," the BCCI note said on the Lankans.