Jason Roy set to terminate ECB contract to play in Major League Cricket

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England opener Jason Roy is set to terminate his incremental contract with the England and Wales Cricket Board (RCB) to play in the inaugural season of the Major League Cricket (MLC) 2023 in the United States.

His Surrey and England teammate Reece Topley is also mulling a similar, an ESPNcricinfo report has suggested. Players with full central contracts are unlikely to feature in the MLC this year, however, players with ECB incremental contracts could explore the option.

Harry Brook, Dawid Malan, Matthew Potts, Roy, Topley and David Willey are the six England players who hold the ECB incremental contracts which are worth around £66,000 (Rs 68 lakh approx.) per year.

The MLC is scheduled to take place from July 13-30 at Grand Prairie Stadium in Texas and has significant backing from India and Australia. Four of the six franchises in the new league have investors who own IPL teams, while Cricket Victoria and Cricket New South Wales have stakes in the other two.

The two semi-finals and finals of the T20 Blast take place on July 15 and are set to clash with the inaugural MLC season. Also two rounds of County Championship 2023 matches will be played from July 19 to July 28. The Hundred will kick off from August 1.

However, ECB expects that MLC is likely to expand in future and could clash directly with the Hundred. In that case the board would opt not to give e No-Objection Certificates (NOCs) to the contracted players. While players would unlikely want to walk out of full-time white-ball contracts, those having incremental deals could opt for a termination.

"Surrey are expecting Roy to play the MLC - most likely for LA Knight Riders - between the end of their Blast season and the start of the Hundred, and that he would have to agree a release from his incremental contract to do so," ESPNcricinfo has reported.

Roy, who played eight matches for Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) in IPL 2023 and is understood to have held informal discussions with the two-time champions, about the possibility of a contract to play for their teams in other leagues including the MLC.